Survey low | Merz in the end: 67 percent see the chancellorship as a failure

44 percent of those surveyed completely agree with the statement “Friedrich Merz should resign as chancellor and party leader.” Photo: dpa/Michael Kappeler Berlin. According to a survey, the majority of Germans are deeply disappointed with Friedrich Merz as Chancellor. 48 percent completely agreed with the statement "Friedrich Merz's chancellorship has failed," and another 19 percent somewhat agreed with the statement, according to a survey by the Ipsos Institute on behalf of "Spiegel."

The survey comes during a phase of serious defeats for the CDU: In Saxony-Anhalt, the AfD achieved a clear victory with 43.8 percent, while the CDU fell by almost 20 percentage points to 17.2 percent. Two weeks later, the party lost the battle for the Red City Hall in Berlin and fell a good seven percentage points behind the Left; in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania it even slipped below the five percent threshold and is no longer represented in a state parliament for the first time.

In the eastern German states, the verdict is even harsher: there, 80 percent of those surveyed fully or somewhat agreed with the statement. In the western German federal states, agreement with this statement is reportedly slightly lower at 64 percent.

The vote on the question of resignation is even more devastating: 44 percent of those surveyed completely agree with the statement “Friedrich Merz should resign as chancellor and party leader,” and another 14 percent tend to agree. Only eleven percent of those surveyed think nothing of resignation at all - a finding that puts the Chancellorship under significantly more pressure than the failed vote of confidence alone.

The values ​​also vary according to population groups: almost 70 percent of women agree with the statement that Merz's chancellorship was a failure, compared to 64 percent of men. Among 18 to 29-year-olds, 75 percent see the Chancellor at the end, while among 60 to 75-year-olds the figure is significantly lower at 58 percent.

Ipsos surveyed around 2,002 people in Germany online between September 30th and October 4th for what it said was a representative survey commissioned by “Spiegel”.

However, those surveyed did not have a clear successor for Merz in the Union in mind. When asked who would be a better Chancellor - CSU boss Markus Söder, Interior Minister Alexander Dobrindt and North Rhine-Westphalia Prime Minister Hendrik Wüst were up for election - 43 percent voted for: none of the above. Almost 14 percent said “don’t know”. Of those mentioned, Söder did best with 20 percent. 16 percent would prefer Wüst, only five percent voted for Dobrindt.

A look into our own camp is particularly telling: even among the Union's supporters, a quarter of those surveyed believe that none of the three candidates mentioned should take the job. They would even rather hand over the task to the sister party: 32 percent want CSU leader Markus Söder as the new chancellor, only 18 percent vote for Hendrik Wüst and just ten percent for Alexander Dobrindt. dpa/nd

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