Saxony-Anhalt Election: Five-Percent Threshold Could Facilitate AfD Absolute Majority

This mechanism gains significance when several parties fail to clear the threshold simultaneously. The more votes go to parties that do not enter the state parliament, the fewer votes are transferred to the parties represented in parliament during seat allocation. As a consequence, the remaining parties – particularly the currently strongest force – could receive a disproportionate share of seats.

How the Five-Percent Threshold Works

Electoral law experts point out that the AfD could in this way achieve an absolute majority of seats in the state parliament even with a vote share significantly below 50 percent. The prerequisite would be that several other parties fail to clear the five-percent threshold and their votes thus drop out of seat allocation. The AfD itself says it sees itself on the upswing, particularly with regard to voter groups that had supported smaller parties in previous elections.

Parallel to the final campaign push, the CDU courted votes with prominent support. Federal Chancellor Friedrich Merz visited the InfraLeuna chemical park in Leuna in the late afternoon to take part in a tour and discussion together with Minister-President and CDU lead candidate Sven Schulze. The site is considered an important symbol of the state's industrial base.

Merz in Leuna: Industrial Policy in the Final Campaign Push

In conversation with employees and company representatives, the focus, according to the CDU delegation, was to be on the future of energy supply, investments in the chemical and industrial location of Saxony-Anhalt, and the competitiveness of German production sites. The visit is part of a series of appearances with which the state party is particularly courting voters in the structurally weaker regions of the state.

Observers also assess the appointment against the backdrop of the federal political framework. Merz had repeatedly emphasized in recent weeks that Germany's economic renewal could only succeed with a strong industrial base. Saxony-Anhalt, with its chemical triangle around Leuna, Schkopau, and Bitterfeld-Wolfen, plays a central role in this.

The campaign as a whole remains volatile in its final days, according to observers. Alongside the question of which smaller parties will manage to clear the five-percent threshold, voters are concerned with whether new majority conditions will emerge in the state parliament. Polls most recently had the AfD in the lead, followed by the CDU and the Left.

What Remains Open Before the Election

It is also being awaited with suspense how the performance of smaller parties on election day will concretely affect seat distribution. Should several lists fail to clear the threshold, the mechanism could influence the composition of the future state parliament more strongly than the pure second-vote result would suggest.

For the CDU, the visit by Merz is, in the assessment of party strategists, primarily a signal to the economic region around Leuna. The aim is to show that the federal government takes the state's industrial policy concerns seriously and is committed to preserving jobs. In local appearances, Schulze repeatedly pointed to the significance of InfraLeuna as one of the largest contiguous chemical sites in Europe.

Until election day, polling institutes expect a continued high level of mobilization. Postal vote shares in Saxony-Anhalt were above the national average in previous state elections, meaning the final seat distribution effect will only become visible after all votes have been counted.