The CDU in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania is threatened with a historic low in polls before the state elections

Some in the CDU in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania are already preparing for the worst-case scenario. A local politician says he wouldn't drop dead of surprise if his party slipped below the five percent threshold. In the polls, the party is at seven percent shortly before the state elections on Sunday. The trend has been pointing downwards for a long time, but recently the downward trend has accelerated again. “If this continues, the party will be finished,” says the CDU man.

If you talk to party members in the country, it is not just the federal government and the Chancellor who are blamed for the misery. Reference is also made to one's own people. Of course, it is difficult to get ahead in the duel between Prime Minister Manuela Schwesig (SPD) and the AfD, they say. But the party leadership didn't really try to do that, for example by removing Berlin.

The CDU in the northeast is actually a party with a proud history. Immediately after the fall of the Wall, she appointed Alfred Gomolka and Berndt Page as Prime Minister twice. The CDU was involved in government in the country for 28 years. She was only in the opposition from 1998 to 2006 and then from 2021, since Schwesig's SPD has governed with the Left. But now there is a threat of the worst result ever for a CDU regional association; Only once did the CDU get less than ten percent, that was in Bremen in 1951.

“The fact that we are so far down is also due to the characters in the country”

One explanation for this is: There was strong headwind from Berlin. When Friedrich Merz made his only election campaign appearance in the country, he was booed, there were whistles and shouts of “Pinocchio”. Merz is considered part of the problem, especially in the east. In the state party, for example, reference is made to an appearance by him a few days ago at an event organized by the Konrad Adenauer Foundation. The Chancellor said that those who are now 70 or even 80 years old have only experienced prosperity. “Only someone from the West could say something like that,” they say. “Unspeakable.” As if those affected in the East had not experienced enormous upheavals after the fall of the Wall. Companies and jobs were lost back then and people had to reorient themselves, it is said, and the pressure to change was enormous.

But from the perspective of the CDU state politicians, Merz is by no means solely responsible for the misery. “The fact that we are so far down is also due to the figures in the country,” says one: not so much the state chairman Daniel Peters, but rather the people behind it. They had “established themselves”. It is unclear whether they even have the hard work to do government work. “And if they don’t burn seriously, then people will notice.” In addition, there are too few women at the top and too few personalities.

During the election campaign, Peters suddenly gave up anything rowdy

In the final stretch of the election campaign, Manuela Schwesig specifically sought to confront the AfD and had posters put up on which she was portrayed as “The Woman Against Blue”. There have recently been complaints about this in the CDU. For example from the general secretary of the federal party, Franziska Hoppermann. She said that Schwesig was putting her party political interests above the interests of Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania. Their attempt to “keep the CDU down” with a personalized election campaign weakens the political center and ultimately helps the AfD. Peters has been making similar comments for a long time. He recently said that Schwesig was running an election campaign against the CDU and the Greens. In doing so, they weaken the center and strengthen the AfD.

In Peters' party, however, people believe that their own top candidate also got into this situation because he was unable to set his own issues. Peters has been state chairman since 2024. At the beginning he was harsh, especially on the subject of migration. At times it was rowdy, in line with the line of his political mentor Eckhardt Rehberg. But then he turned around. During the election campaign, everything riotous was gone.

Conservatives in his party miss his hard line. They criticize, for example, the fact that Peters focused on fish sandwiches during the election campaign. Slogan: “The middle is the best”. This is “something for special students,” says a CDU man. “Do they think the people are stupid?” Instead, topics were missing. “I don’t know of any point where I could say, yes, that’s why I have to vote for her.” Peters could have at least deviated a little from the federal government's line and highlighted the interests of his own people, they say. Ms. Schwesig does that all the time, for example when it comes to her pension.

Many see the CDU's lack of power prospects as a problem

The migration issue, which many in the country still see as unresolved, would be suitable for this - or the issue of cheap energy. Instead, the AfD and BSW were able to occupy the latter, which are calling for the opening of the Nord Stream pipelines that land in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania.

With regard to the AfD, some in the party would have liked Peters to distance himself from the federal party's line. They think he could have called for an end to the firewall. Others, however, consider it unfortunate that Peters ruled out a coalition with the left. From this point of view, the election campaign was particularly affected by the lack of power prospects.

At the moment it looks as if a government without the AfD would only be possible if the SPD, the Left and another party govern together. That could be the Greens, if they manage to get into the state parliament, or the CDU. However, Peters follows the federal party's decision to rule out a coalition with the Left as well as the AfD. Instead, he repeatedly brought up the proposal for a minority government like in Scandinavia. But that, according to his party, will hardly work in this country.