Half of Germans are very dissatisfied with Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD). The other top politicians do almost as badly in a YouGov survey that is available to WELT AM SONNTAG.
In response to the question “For each politician, please indicate which of the following (nine positive) characteristics, if any, apply to the respective person”, 51 percent of respondents in the Scholz case answered “none of them”. Only 18 percent of those surveyed attested the Chancellor’s “good specialist knowledge”, 14 percent considered him “trustworthy” or “confident in crisis situations”.
For the other six positive characteristics, it performs even worse. For example, “is a strong leader” (eight percent) or “detects problems early on” (seven percent).
The interviewees see almost as little positive about the other top politicians listed. The CDU chairman Friedrich Merz has “none” of the nine positive characteristics for 49 percent; FDP boss and Finance Minister Christian Lindner comes here to 44 percent; Bavaria’s Prime Minister and CSU leader Markus Söder at 42.
The Green Ministers Annalena Baerbock (40) and Robert Habeck (38) do best. But even with the latter, just 21 percent see “good specialist knowledge”, 15 percent “leadership” and 16 percent “trustworthiness”.
After all, incumbent Scholz did slightly better than the other top politicians on the Chancellor question at a very low level. When asked “Which of the following people do you think would be the most suitable chancellor in the current situation?” 15 percent named Scholz, 14 percent Habeck and 13 percent Söder. Merz (9), Baerbock (8) and Lindner (4) would like even fewer respondents to be prime ministers.
Even among those questioned who stated that they had voted for the SPD in the most recent federal election, only 42 percent named Scholz as the “most suitable chancellor”. Among the respondents close to the Union, 21 percent consider Merz to be the fittest politician. Söder – who was defeated by Armin Laschet (CDU) in the power struggle before the federal election – comes to 33 percent.
YouGov conducted the survey online. Eligible voters took part between May 16 and 23, 2003.
