CHANCELLOR Friedrich Merz’s Christian Democratic Union (CDU) has finished first in local elections in Germany’s most populous state, but the biggest winner was the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD), which nearly tripled its showing compared with five years ago.

In the first test of voter sentiment since Mr Merz’s government took power, his conservative party took 33.3 per cent of the vote in Sunday’s elections for councils and mayors in North Rhine-Westphalia, while the Social Democrats — for whom the state was long a reliable heartland — took 22.1 per cent, final results showed today.

Both parties did slightly worse than the last municipal elections in 2020. But the AfD took 14.5 per cent — a gain of 9.4 per cent. The anti-immigration party is strongest in the former German Democratic Republic, but Sunday’s showing underlined its arrival as a force in the west as well.

In February’s national election, AfD took 20.8 per cent of the vote to finish second and become the largest opposition party. In North Rhine-Westphalia, it took 16.8 per cent.

AfD co-leader Alice Weidel celebrated “a huge success” on Sunday.

Her party’s rise has been fuelled by hostility to immigration but also other issues including the stagnant economy and the war in Ukraine.

Its support has remained high despite Germany’s domestic intelligence agency classifying it as an extremist organisation, though the agency backed down after AfD launched a legal challenge.

In three of the less prosperous cities in the industrial Ruhr region, AfD mayoral candidates gained enough support to advance to run-off votes on September 28 against candidates from mainstream parties. They will face Social Democrats in Gelsenkirchen and Duisburg and a Christian Democrat in Hagen.

The biggest losers on Sunday were the Greens, who fell to 13.5 per cent from 20 per cent five years ago.