Merkel launches election campaign in national colours to reclaim flag from extremists

Angela Merkel has launched her campaign for a historic fourth term as German chancellor under the colours of the national flag, in an attempt to wrest it back from the far-Right.

With three months to go until September’s elections, Mrs Merkel’s Christian Democrats (CDU) this week unveiled a series of campaign posters featuring the chancellor against a backdrop of black, red and gold.

It is unusual for political parties to use the flag so overtly in a country still haunted by its Nazi past, and Mrs Merkel has herself chided party colleagues for waving the flag in previous elections.

The CDU said the decision to use the flag had been a deliberate move to reclaim it from far-Right parties which have been riding high on an anti-immigrant message.

The campaign “will be a bit more patriotic than before”, Peter Tauber, the party’s general secretary, told the Financial Times.

“Because we are in times where rightwing populists are stronger and we don’t want to leave patriotism to these people.”

The campaign’s central slogan, which is emblazoned across the posters featuring Mrs Merkel, is “For a Germany in which we live well and happily”.

But another slogan unveiled by the party this week was more pointed: “Strengthening Europe means strengthening Germany”.

Mrs Merkel gave her own version of national identity in a guest piece for Bild, the country’s highest-selling newspaper, in which she listed her A-Z of what it means to be German.

Her list included obvious stereotypes such as German sausage, punctuality, “made in Germany” and the Luther Bible.

But in a clear swipe at critics of her refugee policy, she also included Muslims and people of an immigrant background.

And most prominently of all she cited Article 1 of the German constitution: “Human dignity is inviolable.”

The far-Right Alternative for Germany party (AfD) inflicted damaging losses on Mrs Merkel in regional elections last year, campaigning on an anti-migrant platform.

But the challenge from the party has fallen away in recent months and the latest polls show it at just 6.5 per cent.

Mrs Merkel appears to be on course for victory in September, with the CDU on 40 per cent, with a commanding lead of 16 points over their nearest rivals, the Social Democrats (SPD) led by Martin Schulz.

The SPD made their own election pitch, with a pledge to legalise gay marriage within 100 days if they win power.

While civil partnerships have been legal in Germany since 2001, gay marriages are still not recognised.

A poll for the national anti-discrimination agency in January found that 83 per cent of Germans would support legalising gay marriage.

The SPD pledge came a day after the German parliament formally rehabilitated 50,000 gay men convicted for homosexuality under the Nazis.

After decades of lobbying to clear the men’s names, the Bundestag voted to overturn their convictions and offered financial compensation.