It is almost certain that Germany will go to new elections on February 23.
And despite lousy opinion numbers, a leadership that many Germans consider to have been wishy-washy and sluggish and a party that is far from convinced, Olaf Scholz will lead the Social Democrats in the election campaign.
– My concern is that we will lose big, says the social democratic local politician Elif Akdogan to TV4 Nyheterna.
Olaf Scholz arrives at the small venue in a black BMW. No blaring sirens, no police on motorbikes and neither protesters nor selfie hunters waiting for him.
That he would speak at a meeting with social democratic municipal politicians was not planned. But the day before, his biggest rival within the party – Defense Minister Boris Pistorius – has announced that he will not challenge him for the chancellor post.
First get the support of the party – then the country
Scholz may want to celebrate a little, and start rebuilding support within the party, where many members had preferred Pistorius as the top candidate.
He gives a speech and answers several questions. Detailed but woody. After all these years, he still hasn’t learned how to hold a microphone without it booming through the speakers every two minutes. Charisma is at zero, but he still gets long applause.
– He is our candidate. He has weathered several crises, says Angelina Huber, who is the Social Democratic mayor of a small town of 500 inhabitants in southwestern Germany.
But local politician Elif Akdogan from Berlin’s Charlottenburg district looks almost upset.
– Nothing new where you can say, “with this we will be re-elected,” she says to TV4: Nyheterna.
Been calculated before
If there were an election tomorrow, and if the opinion polls are right, it would be a disaster for Scholz. The big winner would be the Christian Democrat Friedrich Merz, who would then become chancellor.
But Scholz has been calculated before. Before the 2021 election, it was between the Christian Democrat Armin Laschet and the green Annalena Baerbock. Both made missteps and poor campaigns, and Scholz sailed past.
It would take a miracle for that to happen again. But the atheist Scholz seems to believe in political miracles.