Germany’s conservative CDU party will hold its first ever digital conference on Friday and Saturday, with a key vote finally determining who will take over from Chancellor Angela Merkel to lead the party into the next election.

CDU party to vote for new leader this Saturday

After coronavirus caused the cancellation of two planned party conferences, the CDU has finally determined that it will hold its first-ever digital congress at the end of this week. The 1.001 delegates will therefore sit at home in front of their computers to take part in the long-awaited vote to choose Angela Merkel’s successor as she retires after 16 years.

The race to take over the CDU party leadership - and thus be the person to lead the party to the general election in September - is currently neck-and-neck, with three candidates vying for the top job: Armin Laschet, the state premier of North Rhine-Westphalia, corporate lawyer Friedrich Merz and the chairman of the Bundestag’s Foreign Affairs Committee, Norbert Röttgen.

Leadership race is anyone’s game

While Merkel has repeatedly stressed that she will not endorse any candidate, she did say on a visit to North Rhine-Westphalia last year that Laschet “has the tools” to be chancellor. However, he is lagging in the polls behind arch-conservative rival Merz, who has indicated that he intends to make a clean break from the Merkel era and shift the party to the right.

There are some fears that such a dramatic shift from Merkel’s centrist and broad-appeal approach could drive support back to other political parties, particularly the Social Democrats. However, the move might also win back the scores of voters who have defected to the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) party in recent years. 

But with none of these candidates currently seeming like a stand-out option, the race really is anybody’s game. Other contenders could be the CSU leader and state premier of Bavaria, Markus Söder, who won widespread praise with his strong response to the pandemic, or Federal Health Minister Jens Spahn.

If no candidate wins more than 50 percent of the vote, it will fall to a run-off round via postal votes. The result will be announced at a press conference on January 22. 

Next general election in September

After 18 years at the helm, Angela Merkel stood down as head of the CDU back in 2018. She was replaced by her preferred successor, Annagret Kamp-Karrenbauer. But Kamp-Karrenbauer (dubbed AKK by the German media) resigned just a few months later over her mishandling of an election scandal in Thuringia. 

The next general election has been scheduled for September 26, 2021.