Wuest's Turkey trip fuels chancellor speculation as Merz approval hits 11%

October 1, 2026 at 06:40 PM2 min

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Hendrik Wuest, premier of North Rhine-Westphalia, met Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan during a three-day business delegation visit this week. The trip came days after the far-right AfD topped a second state election in two weeks, fuelling speculation about a possible change of chancellor. Chancellor Friedrich Merz's approval rating has fallen to a record low of 11%, according to a Forsa poll.

Key Facts

Hendrik Wuest, premier of North Rhine-Westphalia, met Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan during a three-day business delegation visit this week.
The far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) topped a state election for the second time in two weeks, winning in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania on September 20 after Saxony-Anhalt two weeks earlier.
Chancellor Friedrich Merz's approval rating fell to a record low of 11%, according to a Forsa poll this week.
Wuest is the third most popular politician in Germany, behind Defence Minister Boris Pistorius and Baden-Wuerttemberg premier Cem Ozdemir, according to data analysis service ilium.
Eight conservative state premiers publicly backed Merz ahead of the Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania election, where the CDU failed to pass the threshold to enter parliament.

Leadership Speculation

Wuest and officials who work with him have repeatedly denied he has any interest in replacing Merz under current circumstances. The timing of the Turkey trip, underlining Wuest's status as a major player in German politics while Merz was fighting for his political life, fuelled speculation about a possible change of chancellor. Wuest was one of eight conservative state premiers who publicly backed the chancellor in the run-up to the September 20 election in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania. Germany's constitutional system does not make it easy to replace a sitting chancellor, and any change would not solve deep-seated problems ranging from an ageing population to the erosion of its industrial base.

Merz's Political Crisis

The election results underlined how far voters have turned against Merz, who vowed to carry on despite the worst defeat ever inflicted on his Christian Democrats (CDU). The CDU failed to pass the threshold to enter parliament in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania. Merz is widely blamed for failing to deliver on promised economic reforms and hampered by communications missteps that contributed to perceptions of being out of touch with worries over eroding living standards. An opinion poll by the Forsa polling institute showed only 11% approved of the job he was doing, and even among his own party supporters only 39% were satisfied.

Wuest's Rising Profile

Wuest's state of North Rhine-Westphalia has been home to Germany's largest Turkish population since the first Turks arrived as guest workers in the 1960s. Foreign visits by premiers of large German states are relatively common, but the timing of this trip underlined Wuest's status as a major player in German politics. Wuest is the third most popular politician in the country, behind Social Democrat Defence Minister Boris Pistorius and Baden-Wuerttemberg state premier Cem Ozdemir from the Greens, according to ilium.