Özdemir leads Greens to election victory in Baden-Württemberg
Cem Özdemier is likely to become Baden-Württemberg’s state premier. At yesterday’s state parliamentary elections, the Greens won at the eleventh hour.
Stuttgart/Berlin (dpa) - The Greens, with Cem Özdemir at the helm, have won the state election in Baden-Württemberg by a narrow margin. Provisional final results put the CDU only in second place. Özdemir, the 60-year-old former federal government minister, is now likely to succeed Winfried Kretschmann (The Greens) as state premier, Kretschmann having decided not to run again after 15 years in office. The CDU, led by state party chairman Manuel Hagel, had been leading significantly in polls, yet in the end the Green party caught up rapidly.
The AfD has doubled its share of the vote. The SPD has plunged to a historic low in nationwide state parliamentary elections and is only just represented in the parliament. The FDP and the Left party failed to overcome the five percent hurdle.
According to the provisional final results, The Greens received 30.2 percent (2021: 32.6 percent), with the CDU trailing only marginally behind at 29.7 percent (24.1). The AfD received 18.8 percent (9.7). The SPD came in far behind, at just 5.5 percent (11.0). The FDP received 4.4 percent (10.5), while the Left party likewise achieved 4.4 percent (3.6).
Cem Özdemir declared himself the winner in the evening and offered to cooperate with the CDU once again. Özdemir was born in Urach near Stuttgart in 1965. His parents had previously immigrated to Germany from Turkey. Özdemir will thus be the first German state premier with a turkish migrant background.
