German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder's Social Democrats (SPD) suffered a record defeat Sunday in a regional election in the city-state of Hamburg amid backlash over his economic reform drive.
Official results showed Schroeder's SPD picked up 30.5 percent of the vote, versus 47.2 percent for the opposition conservative Christian Democrats (CDU) who currently lead the right-wing populist government.
The SDP share was down 6 percent from the last elections here in 2001, while the CDU leapt up 21 percent from three years ago to ensure it an absolute majority in the regional legislature.
PHOTO: AP
Voters turned out in droves for what turned out to be a public flogging of Social Democrats largely over unpopular cuts in Germany's cherished social welfare system and the country's chronically high unemployment.
The outcome marked the worst result for the SPD in the northern city-state since World War II.
The ballot was seen as a key first test for Schroeder at the start of a marathon election year with 14 municipal, state and European polls, and just weeks after he was forced to give up the party leadership due to anger over the reforms and sinking support.
Incoming SPD leader Franz Muentefering admitted that dissatisfaction with the government in Berlin had cost the party in Hamburg.
"They did not get any tailwinds from Berlin, we know that," he said.
CDU party leader Angela Merkel greeted the "fantastic" result as part of a positive trend for the conservatives on the national level.
The party was carried along in Germany's second city on the soaring popularity of Mayor Ole von Beust.
An affable aristocrat, Beust has claimed credit for a renaissance in the cosmopolitan city, once notorious for its rough-and-tumble dock district, high crime rate and booming prostitution and drugs trades.
He also won marks for breaking up his governing coalition with a right-wing populist, Judge Ronald Schill, after the latter reportedly tried to blackmail him over a purported sexual relationship with the city's top justice official.
That power struggle eventually led to the collapse of the alliance in December after just two-and-a-half years in power.
The coalition took office after a September 2001 election influenced by voters' shock at learning that the city had been home to three of the suicide hijackers who attacked the US earlier that month.
Turnout was down slightly from that vote, with 69 percent of Hamburg's 1.2 million eligible voters coming out on Sunday compared to 71 percent earlier.
Sunday's result is the latest in a series of electoral defeats for the SPD, after they lost power in a poll last year in the northern state of Lower Saxony and were soundly beaten in the states of Hesse and Bavaria.
With a stagnant economy, unemployment hovering at well above four million and a rising public deficit, Schroeder's government has pushed through tough reforms to the dismay of the SPD rank-and-file.
Although Schroeder has consistently denied the rumors, there has been rampant speculation recently that he plans a major reshuffle of his cabinet after the overhaul of the SPD leadership on Feb. 6.
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