Local governments - Residents of Saarland possess various options.
On June 9th, Saarland's citizens will head to the polls for a variety of elections. They'll be voting for members of the European Parliament, as well as city and district councils (5 of each), a regional assembly (for Saarbrücken), and municipal councils (52 of them). There are also 23 direct elections for mayors, mayors, and district administrators.
This includes the mayoral elections in Völklingen, Saarlouis, and Homburg, as well as the district administrators in the St. Wendel district, the Saarpfalz district, Neunkirchen, and the Saarbrücken regional assembly. In addition, there are mayoral elections in the cities of Wadern, Mettlach, and Dillingen/Saar.
For the European election, those aged 16 and 17 can now exercise their voting rights for the very first time. However, the mandated voting age for municipal elections still stands at 18. A total of 34 parties are vying for your vote in the European election. The CDU is the only Saarland-based party running a list for the election, while the other parties share a joint list for all nations.
In the past, there was only one representative from Saarland in the European Parliament: Manuela Ripa, a lawyer from the Ecological Democratic Party (ODP). She's running for re-election as the top candidate on her party's list.
The exact number of eligible voters will be determined on election day, according to a spokesperson for the state election commission. In the tiniest German federal state, there were roughly 767,500 eligible voters at the last European election. During the municipal elections in 2019, there were a total of 806,500 individuals on the electoral roll.
The option to vote by mail proved to be quite popular, the spokesperson revealed. However, there aren't any statewide figures available. Approximately 10,000 election workers will be busy in Saarland on election day.
The Bündnis Sahra Wagenknecht (BSW) is participating in the European elections for the first time and occasionally in the local elections. This newly formed party led by former Left politician Sahra Wagenknecht is contesting the elections in two municipalities: Ottweiler and Dillingen. Wagenknecht and her husband Oskar Lafontaine reside in Saarland's Merzig town.
In Saarland, there's a straightforward voting system, with just a single vote system in place. Candidates can't receive multiple votes or distribute votes across various lists (cumulation and panachage, respectively). This simplifies the counting process.
In the 2019 European elections, the CDU secured 32.5% of the votes, the SPD captured 23.1%, the Greens garnered 13.2%, the AfD received 9.6%, and the Left obtained 6.0%. In the municipal elections, the CDU won 34.0% of the votes, the SPD collected 30.0%, the Greens earned 12.6%, the AfD gathered 8.6%, and the Left scored 7.5%.
The state-level results from the European election will be made public by 11:00 p.m. on the day of the elections. At that time, the last polling stations in the EU will be closing. The municipal election outcomes are expected on Monday, while the outcomes from the direct elections of district administrators and mayors are likely to be revealed on Sunday evening.
