Polls have closed in Germany's regional North Rhine-Westphalia (NRW) elections, the country's most populous state and projections by German media predict a win for Angela Merkel and her Christian Democratic Union.

Current figures presented by German media on Sunday show the conservatives leading with 34 percent with the social democrats at around 30 percent.

The NRW elections are serving as a prelude to September's national vote.

The pressure is on the Social Democrats, led by Martin Schulz, in this election for the state legislature in NRW.

It is Schulz's home territory, though he is not on the ballot, and home to 17.9 million people, nearly a quarter of Germany's population.

The western state, which includes Cologne, Dusseldorf and the Ruhr industrial region, has been led by the Social Democrats for all but five years since 1966.

READ MORE: Germany vote tests public opinion before election

A defeat for centre-left governor Hannelore Kraft would be a major blow for the Social Democrats after poor showings in two previous state elections punctured the party's euphoria over Schulz's nomination to run as a challenger to Merkel in September.

Last weekend, they were beaten by Merkel's party in Schleswig-Holstein in Germany's far north.

Merkel's conservatives in the state, led by challenger Armin Laschet, a liberal-minded deputy leader of the Christian Democrats, had little to lose after a dreadful showing in the state vote five years ago.

They have sought to portray Kraft's state government as slack on security.

They point to burglary statistics, incidents such as the New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Cologne in 2015 and questions over regional officials' handling of sometime resident Anis Amri, the rejected Tunisian asylum-seeker who drove a truck into a Christmas market in Berlin last December, killing 12 people.

They also have attacked what they say is regional authorities' poor handling of education and infrastructure projects.

READ MORE: Merkel's CDU wins elections in Schleswig-Holstein

Kraft's coalition partners, the Greens, are polling poorly and chances of their alliance keeping its majority look poor.

The pro-business Free Democrats, eyeing a return to the national parliament in September after their 2013 ejection, look set for a strong performance.

Meanwhile the nationalist Alternative for Germany, or AfD, hopes to enter its 13th state legislature though its popularity appears to have faded as the migrant influx has receded and the party has been rent by infighting.

After a blaze of publicity earlier this year, Schulz, who chose not to join the government when he returned to Germany after being president of the European Parliament, has struggled to maintain a high profile.

National polls show the Social Democrats trailing Merkel's conservatives by up to 10 points after drawing level earlier this year.</s>Chancellor Angela Merkel’s party decisively won an election in Germany’s most populous state on Sunday, handing her Social Democratic opponents a humiliating defeat and further boosting her momentum as she seeks a fourth term in September.

The Christian Democratic Union’s victory in North Rhine-Westphalia, home to more than one-fifth of German voters, is a resounding confirmation for Merkel (62) and boosts her standing before a series of international summits starting this month, including meetings with US president Donald Trump.

She’s due to host French president Emmanuel Macron in Berlin on Monday for their first meeting after his inauguration. “Everybody said Merkel is tired and finished,” said Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer, a CDU member who won re-election as Saarland state premier in March. “We proved that precisely the opposite is true.”

The CDU took about 34 per cent of the vote on Sunday and the SPD less than 31 per cent, its worst showing since the second World War in its industrial stronghold, according to separate projections by public broadcasters ARD and ZDF. With their Green coalition partners slumping to 6 per cent, the SPD was voted out in the state for only the second time in the last 50 years. Support for the pro-market Free Democrats rose to about 12 per cent. For Martin Schulz’s Social Democrats, it was a disastrous third straight loss in state elections since Germany’s second-biggest party picked him as chairman and candidate for the chancellorship in January.

North Rhine-Westphalia state premier Hannelore Kraft said she’s stepping down as regional party head after the SPD sank to an all-time low in North Rhine-Westphalia. “This was a whopping defeat,” Schulz (61), a former European Parliament president who hails from the state, told reporters in Berlin. “It’s a tough day for the SPD and also tough for me personally.”

Just over four months from the federal election on September 24th, the defeat is likely to trigger debate within the SPD about its choice of candidate and campaign stance, which has focused on income equality and helping voters who feel left behind in Germany’s economic boom. For Merkel, it’s a vindication of her two-prong approach in North Rhine-Westphalia. While her surrogates talked up the chancellor’s international standing, Merkel attacked the state government’s record on debt and crime, including the mass sexual assaults on women in Cologne on New Year’s Eve in 2015. CDU supporters at party headquarters in Berlin erupted in cheers when projections from the region on the Belgian and Dutch borders were announced at 6pm local time.

“We’re in much better shape now than we would have thought 10 weeks ago,” Peter Altmaier, Merkel’s chief of staff in the chancellery, told reporters. “Elections are won at the political centre.”

North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany’s biggest regional economy, has tripped up the Social Democrats before. In 2005, then chancellor Gerhard Schröder called an early national ballot after the SPD lost an election in the state. Merkel won the federal election, lifting her to the chancellery, where she’s been ever since. – (Bloomberg)</s>About 13.1 million eligible voters in North Rhine-Westphalia are casting ballots to elect a new regional parliament for the sprawling industrial region, which has a large migrant population and has been a Social Democratic Party (SPD) stronghold for decades.

But surveys ahead of the vote show the centre-left party running neck-and-neck with Angela Merkel’s Christian Democratic Union, with some even placing the CDU ahead.

The opinion polls were the latest indication that initial enthusiasm for the new SPD leader, Martin Schulz, could be fizzling out.

The SPD had been ailing nationwide but saw a surge in support in February when Schulz took over. But that support failed to translate into votes in the last two state elections, when the CDU won comfortably.

Schulz shrugged off the two disappointments.

"Sometimes you lose, sometimes you win. I have the impression that Sunday will be a day when we will say ‘we win’," he told voters at a rally in Leverkusen on Thursday.

An election in Germany’s biggest state is always significant, but it carries higher stakes this year, being the last regional vote before national polls and having a direct impact on whether the SPD can close the gap nationwide with the CDU.

By 08:00 GMT, the CDU’s candidate Armin Laschet had already cast his vote in Aachen.

"There is a real chance that we can win. Now it’s time for the voters to decide," he said in remarks carried by national news agency DPA.

In the run-up to Sunday’s vote, Schulz had held more than 30 rallies in the state, where he began his political career in his hometown of Wuerselen.

The party is banking its hopes on incumbent state premier Hannelore Kraft, 55, who secured 39.1% in a 2012 vote, while the CDU clinched just over 26%. "If Kraft succeeds, then the chances of the SPD’s bid to take back the chancellery grow. If she loses, it would mean that the Schulz train has slammed against a wall," the weekly Spiegel magazine said.

Political analyst Oskar Niedermayer also noted the state’s significance to the SPD, telling AFP that "a defeat there would be a disastrous symbol" for the party.

Schulz is hoping that his push for "social justice" will resonate in North Rhine-Westphalia, which has lagged behind western Germany economically.

He argues that many people are struggling in temporary or low-paid jobs even though the country as a whole is growing richer.

But Merkel has also been pounding the streets in the state of 18 million people, including 4.2 million of migrant origin.

In the town of Haltern am See on Wednesday, she took aim at Schulz’s arguments, saying the CDU offers "justice in the sense of jobs, strong budgets, funds for local communities".

She also urged voters to look at her government’s economic record — with 7.5% unemployment, the state fares worse than the national rate of 5.8%, she said.

Mindful that local issues can tip the balance, Merkel has also blamed the incumbents for persistent traffic jams that "are longer than from here to the moon".

The CDU has also accused the state’s SPD-Green governing coalition of security failures.

State interior minister Ralf Jaeger has faced criticism for failing to detain Anis Amri, the Tunisian asylum seeker suspected in the deadly Berlin Christmas market rampage last year.

Amri had lived in the state and was deemed a threat by intelligence officials, but Jaeger argued that there was insufficient evidence to lock him up.

On Jaeger’s watch, Cologne also became the scene of mass sexual assaults by groups of mostly North African men on New Year’s Eve of 2015-2016, inflaming the debate over the 890,000 asylum seekers Germany welcomed in 2015.

The populist AfD (Alternative for Germany), which has railed against the migration influx, hopes to win its first seats in North Rhine-Westphalia, which would give it seats in 13 of 16 state parliaments.</s>The first forecasts show that German Chancellor Angela Merkel's Christian Democratic Union (CDU) party is winning the election in the local parliament in Germany's North Rhine-Westphalia.</s>Angela Merkel appeared on course for a historic fourth term as German chancellor on Sunday after winning a crushing victory in regional elections seen as a bellwether of the national mood.

In the last major vote before September’s general election, Mrs Merkel’s Christian Democrats (CDU) seized control of North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany’s most populous state and a traditional stronghold for her main rival, Martin Schulz.

According to initial exit polls, the CDU won 34.5 per cent of the vote in elections to the state parliament, compared to 30.5 per cent for Mr Schulz’s Social Democrats (SPD) — a swing of more than 8 points.

The scale of the victory installed Mrs Merkel as firm favourite to triumph again in September, while Mr Schulz’s campaign looked in deep trouble after the SPD lost a state it has controlled for all but five of the last 50 years.

“I’ve taken a real hit tonight,” a visibly shaken Mr Schulz said. “I’m not a magician. We have to think what my share of the responsibility was.”</s>German Chancellor Angela Merkel is seeking to cement her lead in the run-up to the national elections in September with a regional election in her country's largest state.

Around 13m Germans are eligible to cast a vote in the state elections in North Rhine-Westphalia (NRW) today, which is home to almost a quarter of the country's population.

NRW has previously been a stronghold for the Social Democrats (SPD), the party lead by former European parliament president Martin Schulz.

Read more: PM: Merkel's "illusions" warning shows difficulty of the Brexit talks

The SPD received a boost in the polls when Schulz took over the leadership, but has since been flagging. Last month, Merkel's CDU landed a convincing defeat over the SPD in Saarland, and last week, the CDU took northern state of Schlewig-Holstein.

And, the final polls on the NRW election suggest Merkel's party is one percentage point ahead of Schulz's.

Merkel's popularity in Germany has suffered as a result of her open-door immigration policy, but the CDU has taken a lead in the NRW campaign by promising to curb migrant crime.

The poll is a crucial test of the CDU's strategy ahead of Germany's general election in September, where Merkel is seeking to extend her 11-year reign over Europe's economic powerhouse.</s>DUESSELDORF, Germany, May 14 (Reuters) - German Chancellor Angela Merkel's conservatives defeated the ruling Social Democrats (SPD) in a key state election on Sunday, exit polls showed, boosting their hopes of retaining power in September's national vote.

The Christian Democrats (CDU) saw a strong surge of support in Germany's most populous state of North Rhine-Westphalia (NRW), which is home to one in five German voters and has often been a national trend-setter in elections.

The CDU won 34.5 percent, up from 26.3 percent in 2012, according to an exit poll on public broadcaster ARD just after polls closed.

The SPD, which has ruled NRW for most of the past half century, fell to 30.5 percent from 39.1 percent. It was the third straight state defeat for the SPD since March, casting a shadow over their once bright hopes of denying Merkel a fourth four-year term in the national election on Sept. 24.

It was not clear whether the liberal Free Democrats (FDP), the CDU's preferred partners projected to win 12 percent, had enough votes for the two allies to form a majority in the state.

What was clear is that the ruling SPD-Greens coalition fell far short of a majority as the Greens won about 6 percent, down from 11.3 percent in 2012. The nationalist Alternative for Germany (AfD), which has no coalition allies, won 7.5 percent.

"This is a great day for North Rhine-Westphalia," said local CDU leader Armin Laschet, who will most likely become state premier. "We accomplished our two goals: defeating the SPD-Greens coalition and becoming the strongest party in the state."

SPD state premier Hannelore Kraft quickly conceded defeat and said she would stand down as her party's local leader.

"It's sad we lost so many districts. I take personal responsibility for this defeat ...," she said.

The SPD's national leader and its candidate for chancellor in the September election, Martin Schulz, was equally gloomy.

"This is a difficult day for the SPD and a difficult day for me personally. It´s my home state where we suffered a bitter defeat. We lost an important state election," he told reporters.

Merkel, whose re-election hopes earlier this year seemed to be uncertain due to the initial popularity of Schulz when he took over the SPD leadership, managed to revive her fortunes over the last two months with a victory in Saarland on March 26 and an upset defeat of the ruling SPD in Schleswig-Holstein.

The CDU unseated the SPD in NRW in May 2005, prompting a snap federal election. The conservatives won the national election, giving Merkel her first term as chancellor.

The SPD has ruled NRW for 46 of the last 51 years. The CDU only ruled in NRW for five years during that half century, from 2005 until 2010. (Writing by Joseph Nasr; Editing by Gareth Jones)</s>BERLIN (Sputnik) — The Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD) head Martin Schulz on Sunday admitted SPD’s defeat in the elections of local parliament in German Federal State of North Rhine-Westphalia.

"This is a hard day for SPD, a hard day for me personally: I come from the Federal State, where we have suffered defeat," Schulz said.

Schulz also expressed support for Hannelore Kraft, the former head of government in North Rhine-Westphalia, who had announced earlier on Sunday that she would quit her political career after the results of elections in local parliament were announced.

"We win together, we lose together… We will continue to struggle on September 24," Shulz said.

The upcoming nationwide parliamentary elections to Bundestag are due to take place on September 24.</s>Schulz announced he would not stand again as President of the European Parliament, November 2016, in order to return to domestic politics and run for the Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD) against German Chancellor Angela Merkel in the forthcoming federal election, September 2017.

The CDU won 33 percent of the votes against the SPD's 31.2 percent — a significant blow to Schulz, particularly because North Rhine-Westphalia is his home state and a heartland of the SPD. Merkel's party put on 6.7 percent, compared to the previous election and the SPD lost 7.9 percent.

Merkel's party also won the regional elections in Schleswig-Holstein, May 2017 and Saarland, March 2017, further knocking the wind out of Schulz's sails German media quickly jumped to dub the North Rhine-Westphalia result a "political earthquake" that many see as paving the way for a Merkel victory in the federal election in September.

When Schulz originally stood for the leadership battle, he was seen as a strong candidate and the polls showed his to be a threat to Merkel. However, his success appears to be short-lived, with some putting his failures down to being too closely connected to the Brussels machine, after his stint at the EP president.

In March, 2017, a poll found that 44 percent of voters would prefer Schulz to form the next government, rather than Merkel.

Although the SPD and CDU/CSU were then neck and neck in the polls — both on 32 percent — which would lead to another coalition government, most Germans wanted it to be led by Schulz, rather than Merkel, who is facing her toughest election since becoming chancellor in 2005.

In just a matter of a few weeks, the situation has reversed with Merkel — despite drawing criticism over her "open doors" policy on refugees — now buoyant and looking set for her fourth term.</s>Though roller-coaster elections have recently become the norm in established democracies (witness France’s recent whirlwind campaign), Germany appears determined to be an exception. As her party clinched yet another key regional election, Chancellor Angela Merkel is close to establishing her dominance in the September general election well ahead of time.

Former European Parliament President Martin Schulz created a hint of an intrigue in January when he decided to run against Merkel as the top candidate of SPD, the Social Democratic Party that is now the junior coalition partner of Merkel’s Christian Democrats (CDU). It seemed briefly that someone of his caliber, conviction and campaigning skill could present a credible alternative; the SPD even topped the CDU in some polls, prompting editorials wondering if Germans were tired of Merkel and the chancellor herself was tired of campaigning — this is, after all, her fourth run as her party’s lead candidate. Thanks to the “Schulz effect,” the SPD elected him its leader with an unprecedented 100 per cent of the vote, bestowing on him the nickname “100 per cent Schulz.”

When it came to winning actual elections, though, the CDU has proved a tougher rival than Social Democrats expected. First, it won convincingly in Saarland in March after scaring voters with the possibility of an SPD alliance with more radical leftist forces. And on Sunday, it triumphed in the northern state of Schleswig-Holstein, where the SPD had ruled in coalition with the Greens and a party representing the state’s Danish minority. Merkel’s party improved on its 2012 result, while the Social Democrats performed worse — and lost the state after 12 years as the ruling party. The CDU will govern the state now, likely with the liberal Free Democratic Party and the Greens, kicking the SPD out.

It’s a tribute to Merkel’s political skill that it’s not quite clear to outside observers how she gets these victories. She appears to practice some kind of highly effective political zen.

Both in Saarland and in Schleswig-Holstein, polls showed the main parties running neck and neck just weeks before voting day. Then the SPD made a tiny misstep that didn’t appear life-threatening. In Saarland, its leader showed perhaps too much enthusiasm for kicking the CDU out of government, even if it meant a riskier coalition. In Schleswig-Holstein, the state’s Social Democrat prime minister, Torsten Albig, gave an interview to celebrity magazine Bunte, going into some details about the breakup of his marriage. It was widely seen as the wrong venue for a politician to vent on personal matters, and Albig’s description of his ex-wife as someone too caught up in mothering and housekeeping rubbed women voters the wrong way. It also irritated Albig’s coalition partners. The SPD can blame the state prime minister for being too complacent and tone-deaf to stave off defeat. But then, the CDU could have stumbled too but didn’t, playing calmly through the endgame for the second time in a row.

“I am hellishly annoyed,” Schulz said of the defeat. “It gets under the skin.” That’s nothing, however, to what he will feel a week from now if the SPD doesn’t come first in Germany’s most populous state, North Rhine-Westphalia. The Social Democrats crushed the CDU 39 to 26 per cent in the 2012 election, and they run the state in a comfortable coalition with the Greens. Until recently, they enjoyed hefty poll leads. The SPD state prime minister, Hannelore Kraft, is one of the party’s federal leaders and a popular politician on a federal level; she is on her second term, and she has far more political weight and cachet with voters than her CDU rival, Armin Laschet — but lately, he’s been gaining and she’s been losing poll support. Again, the CDU has snuck up on the SPD, and the election will be closer than the 2012 one. Merkel’s party even stands a reasonable chance of winning.

The quiet CDU resurgence despite the party’s lack of flashy campaigning tactics means the Christian Democrats have something going for them that’s hard to overcome even if one doesn’t make mistakes. That something is the quiet attraction of Merkel. She has sat out the “Schulz effect,” and the CDU now has a clear lead in the national election race. While in February and March, many observers wrote her off as a spent force, no one doubts her competence and ability to keep the German economy growing in adverse circumstances. There has to be a strong reason for German voters to trade her for somebody else. Schulz hasn’t hit on such a reason. As for the smaller parties, there’s less and less of a chance of a strong showing by anti-immigrant or far-left forces. Germans see how insecure other European nations feel, and they lean toward the stability of Merkel’s orderly, subdued confidence.

In the last televised debate before losing the French presidential election, nationalist candidate Marine Le Pen quipped that France would be ruled by a woman in any case — either by her or by Merkel. The German chancellor’s presence is clearly felt even in those elections in which she is not running, both inside and outside Germany. That is not something German voters are likely to squander. It has been during Merkel’s long tenure that Germany has benefited greatly from being part of the European Union and the euro zone, and giving up leadership in such useful organizations just to shake things up a little is not the German way.
Voters in the German state of North Rhine-Westphalia head to the polls, with the media suggesting a victory for Angela Merkel's CDU over the SPD, who have lead the state for all but five years since 1966.