Who will be sworn in as Saxony-Anhalt's next premier?

Saxony-Anhalt's election has created a situation in which the largest party may soon control the state government, even though it cannot do so by itself. The AfD won the most seats, but the parties opposing it have not managed to agree on a common alternative. That failure has put AfD politician Ulrich Siegmund in a stronger position than the election result alone would suggest.

The Polymarket contract asks whether Siegmund will become premier by May 31, 2027. It is priced at a 65% probability. The premier is the head of Saxony-Anhalt's government, and the winner will be chosen by the state's 83-member parliament, called the Landtag.

The voting rules make the situation complicated. A candidate needs 42 votes, or more than half of the parliament, in either of the first two rounds. If no candidate reaches that number, lawmakers can hold a final round. In that round, the candidate with more votes in favor wins.

The AfD won 39 seats in the September 6 election, so it is three seats short of the number needed in the first two rounds. The other 44 seats are divided among the CDU, Social Democrats, Greens, Left, and BSW. In theory, these parties could prevent the AfD from taking power by agreeing on another premier. In practice, they have not found a way to work together.

The BSW holds five seats and has chosen a position between the two sides. Its lead candidate, Claudia Wittig, again rejected the idea of voting for Siegmund on September 22. However, the party has also said it would abstain in a final round. That means BSW lawmakers would not support Siegmund, but they would not vote against him either.

This makes the other parties responsible for stopping him. They could try to elect a candidate who belongs to no party, but that plan lost momentum when the CDU refused to join talks about such a government on September 24. The CDU said it would remain outside the state government and argued that forming a government was the AfD's responsibility.

Without an agreed alternative, the opposition's most realistic option is to force a draw. In a final round, the AfD could give Siegmund 39 votes. If all 39 lawmakers from the other four parties voted against him and the BSW abstained, the result would be 39 to 39. And that, logically, would not make Siegmund premier. A tied vote elects nobody, so the parliament would have to vote again.

The difficulty is that the opposition would need to repeat this strategy every time. All 39 of its lawmakers would have to attend each vote and vote against Siegmund. The ballots are secret, so party leaders cannot guarantee that every member will follow the plan. If the deadlock continues until May 31, 2027, Siegmund's contract would lose, but even one opposition member changing position could end the blockade.

Siegmund therefore has a much simpler path. He needs to win only once, while his opponents must remain united through an unknown number of secret votes. The CDU says its 15 lawmakers will stay together, but its refusal to help build an alternative government makes a lasting blockade less likely.

The AfD may not have enough seats to govern alone, but its opponents have not shown that they can act as a united bloc. That is why we think Siegmund's chance is higher than the market's 65% estimate. We expect him to become premier by the deadline.