Angela Merkel is set to secure the backing of her conservative party at its conference starting tomorrow for a fourth term.
The German chancellor is facing up to what could be the most challenging period of her 11 years at the helm of Europe’s biggest economy.
With no predecessor on the horizon and her political opponents having failed to produce any credible alternative candidates, 62-year-old Merkel is favourite to win next year’s election.
Merkel’s decision to again head up her Christian Democratic Union (CDU) party’s campaign at next September’s election is a signal of stability in an uncertain world, said Hajo Funke, a political scientist at Berlin’s Free University.
“It’s important for Germany to retain a strong figure both as CDU chief and as chancellor,” said Gottfried Ludewig, a party delegate from Berlin. “She has demonstrated that she can govern Germany well in difficult times.”
The chancellor’s plans to run again come against a backdrop of new threats posed to Europe by the rise of nationalist, populist forces and a newly unpredictable White House following last month’s election of New York real estate billionaire Donald Trump.
A poll published last month by the weekly Bild am Sonntag showed 55% of Germans want Merkel, a trained quantum chemist who grew up in communist East Germany, to remain chancellor.
The poll found 39% were against her continuing as chancellor.
“We are the strongest party by a considerable margin,” finance minister and close Merkel CDU ally Wolfgang Schaeuble told DPA.
The conference vote tomorrow for Merkel’s reelection as CDU chief will test her current political authority in the party.
In particular, it will reveal just how much Merkel’s standing has suffered as a result of the nation’s refugee crisis after she opened the country’s borders to allow about 1mn asylum-seekers into Germany over the last year.
The build-up to Germany’s September’s poll will also be accompanied by a series of key elections across Europe, including in France and the Netherlands, which are likely to underscore the backlash against mainstream political parties.
Opinion surveys show that the CDU and their Bavarian-based allies, the Christian Social Union (CSU), as regaining political momentum after the deep divisions caused in the CDU-CSU by Merkel’s liberal refugee stance.
However, the shock votes in Britain to exit the EUuropean Union and in the US to elect Trump as president have fuelled fears in Germany of an upset at next September’s German election following the rise of new anti-foreigner party Alternative for Germany (AfD).
With about 12% of the national vote, the AfD is currently the country’s third political force after it successfully capitalised on voter opposition to Merkel’s open-door refugee policy and anxieties about globalisation.
Still, analysts are sceptical about the potential of the AfD to transform itself into anything more than a protest party.
“As a phenomenon, it is limited in Germany because of the nation’s history,” said Funke, referring to the nation’s Nazi past.
But the AfD’s success means the CDU party conference is likely to underline the Merkel government’s tougher stance on asylum and its moves to boost security to deal with terrorism and organised crime.
This year’s CDU conference will be held in the western German city of Essen, a city that has special meaning for Merkel as it here that she was first elected CDU chief.
Since then, she has been returned eight times as the CDU head, securing 96.7% of the vote when the ballot for party leader was last held two years ago.

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