German Chancellor Angela Merkel told by allies to listen to the wishes of nationalist voters

German Chancellor Angela Merkel has been urged by allies to head off electoral gains made by far-right party Alternative for Germany (AfD).

Merkel is in the process of negotiating a coalition with the left-wing Green party and pro-business FDP after last Sunday’s general election.

The chancellor’s Christian Democrat (CDU) party lost ground in the election with its share of the vote falling from 41 per cent to 33 per cent. This was in stark contrast with a surge by the AfD, which took 13 per cent of the vote, making it Germany’s third largest party.

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Two conservative state premiers called on Merkel to recognise the wishes of the electorate.

“People want Germany to stay Germany,” Stanislaw Tillich, premier of Saxony – where AfD topped the polls –told the Funke newspaper network.

“They don’t want parallel societies and rising criminality.”

And Rainer Haseloff, premier of Saxony-Anhalt told Die Welt:

People want to know how Germany will preserve its identity.

The CDU’s Bavarian sister party the CSU has called for a hard immigration ceiling. And such calls, while agreeing with the placing of a limit, could strengthen the CSU’s wishes as part of coalition talks with the Greens and FDP.

Read more: Angela Merkel wins German election but far right AfD makes gains