Far-right AfD leads over CDU in poll ahead of Saxony's September vote

The far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) is ahead of the centre-right Christian Democratic Union (CDU) in Saxony some nine months ahead of state elections, an opinion poll released on Tuesday showed.

In a survey conducted by the opinion research institute Civey and the Saxony newspaper, Sächsische Zeitung, the AfD scored 37% compared to the CDU's 33%.

A month ago, the two parties were neck and neck in the former East German state, the same survey showed.

The Social Democratic Party (SPD) of German Chancellor Olaf Scholz is now at 3% and is in danger of not making it into the state parliament, since a 5% minimum is needed.

The pro-business Free Democratic Party (FDP), which is also in the federal government's coalition, is now at 1%.

The Greens, who are also in the ruling federal coalition, are at 7% and the Left Party with 8% are also lagging far behind the AfD and CDU in a state which counts Leipzig and Dresden as its biggest cities.

With such a result in just under nine months, forming a government in Saxony would be extremely difficult.

All other parties have ruled out a coalition with the AfD. In purely mathematical terms, an alliance between the CDU, the Greens and the Left Party would still be possible - but the CDU has also banned cooperation with the Left Party. Even a CDU-Green minority government would not be possible without the support of the Left Party.

Saxon voters go to the polls in a state election on September 1.

The pollsters asked 3,004 people the typical German Sunday polling questions: "Who would you vote for if state elections were held in Saxony next Sunday?"

The survey was conducted online between December 18 and January 1. The results are representative, taking into account the margin of error of 2.9%.