German right-wing party on course to enter parliament
PFORZHEIM, Germany — A nationalist party that wants Germany to close its borders to migrants, give up the euro and end sanctions against Russia is predicted to enter parliament for the first time, propelled by voters’ anger at Chancellor Angela Merkel’s decision to admit over a million refugees since 2015.
Alternative for Germany, or AfD, is forecast to take between 8 and 11 per cent of the vote on Sept. 24, giving it dozens of lawmakers in the national parliament. Some polls even project that it could even place third behind Merkel’s party and the centre-left Social Democrats.
If the predictions are correct, it would be the first time in 60 years that a party to the right of Merkel’s conservative Union bloc has attracted enough votes to enter the Bundestag.
“It’s quite an achievement for a right-wing party to clear the 5 per cent minimum threshold,” said Gideon Botsch, a political scientist at the University of Potsdam near Berlin.