Close polls in Germany point to close election finish Germany's election campaigning marathon has entered its final sprint - ahead of the September 22 vote. A Politbarometer survey by Forschungsgruppe published on September 19 suggested the combined leftist opposition parties were trailing Merkel's centre-right coalition by just one percent. Merkel's Christian Democratic Union (CDU) party and its rivals, the Social Democratic Party (SPD), both want to keep out eurosceptics Alternative fuer Deutschland (AfD). SPD candidate Peer Steinbrück, told supporters in Berlin: "We have not only a political interest in keeping this wonderful Europe together, we also have an economic interest and that's why you should not follow some Pied Piper about Europe." The AfD was polling at around 4 percent, under the 5 percent threshold to enter parliament.