Merkel makes final push for successor at Germany's polls

AACHEN (Germany) • Chancellor Angela Merkel urged Germans to give her would-be successor Armin Laschet the vote to shape Germany's future, in a last-ditch push to shore up his beleaguered campaign 24 hours before Germans vote.

Mr Laschet, 60, is trailing behind Social Democrat challenger Olaf Scholz in the race for the chancellery, though final polls put the gap between them within the margin of error, making it one of the most unpredictable votes in recent years.

Dr Merkel had planned to keep a low profile in the election battle as she prepares to bow out of politics after 16 years in power. But she has found herself dragged into the frantic campaign of the unpopular chairman of her CDU party, Mr Laschet.

In the last week of the campaign, Dr Merkel took Mr Laschet to her constituency by the Baltic coast and on Friday headlined the closing rally gathering the conservatives' bigwigs in Munich.

She tugged at the heartstrings of Germany's predominantly older electorate on Friday, calling on them to keep her conservatives in power for the sake of stability - a trademark of Germany.

"To keep Germany stable, Armin Laschet must become chancellor, and the CDU and CSU must be the strongest force," she said.

Yesterday, she travelled to Mr Laschet's home town and constituency Aachen, a spa city near Germany's western border with Belgium and the Netherlands, where he was born and still lives.

She underlined that climate protection will be a key challenge of the next government, but said this would not be achieved "simply through rules and regulations".

Hundreds of thousands of people descended on the streets on Friday urging change and greater climate protection, with a leading activist calling today's election the vote "of a century".

With the clock ticking down to the election, the SPD's Mr Scholz was also staying close to home at the other end of the country to chase down last votes. He will be holding "dialogues on the future" with voters in his constituency of Potsdam - a city on the outskirts of Berlin famous for its palaces that once housed Prussian kings.

Mr Scholz, currently finance minister in Dr Merkel's coalition government, has avoided making mistakes on the campaign trail, and largely won backing as he sold himself as the "continuity candidate".

Described as capable but boring, Mr Scholz has consistently beaten Mr Laschet by wide margins when it comes to popularity.

As election day loomed, Mr Laschet's conservatives were closing the gap, with one poll even putting them just one percentage point behind the SPD's 26 per cent.

As polls showed the lead widening for the SPD, the conservatives turned to their greatest asset - the still widely popular Dr Merkel.

Yet roping in the Chancellor is not without risks, said political analyst Oskar Niedermayer of Berlin's Free University.

"Merkel is still the most well-liked politician. But the joint appearances can become a problem for Laschet because they are then immediately being compared to each other," he said.

"And it could therefore backfire because people could then think that Merkel is more suitable than Laschet."

AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE