There was a glitch in the calculation of the seat distribution in the new Saxon state parliament. Due to a software error, an incorrect number of seats for the individual parties was published after the state election, as the state election authority announced. The result then had to be corrected.

Accordingly, the Greens and the SPD will each get one seat more, and the CDU and the AfD will each get one seat less than initially stated. Despite the change, the previous coalition of the CDU, Greens and SPD still does not have a majority in the new state parliament. However, the recalculation means that the second-placed AfD will lose the so-called blocking minority in the state.

AfD wants to investigate internally

A blocking minority means that a party has more than a third of the seats in the state parliament. In this case, it can prevent certain state laws that are decided by a two-thirds majority of all MPs. In Saxony, as in other federal states, constitutional judges and the head of the state audit office are elected by a two-thirds majority of all parliamentarians. Certain posts could not have been filled without the AfD’s approval. It could also have prevented the state parliament from dissolving itself.

The Saxon AfD general secretary Jan Zwerg took note of the new calculation calmly. His party wants to review the calculation basis internally. State party leader Jörg Urban stressed that the issue of new debt was particularly important to him. The state parliament would have to approve certain borrowings with a two-thirds majority. He also announced that with the new majorities in the state parliament he wanted to set up a committee of inquiry into Corona and the allocation of funds for asylum policy.

New seat distribution in the Saxon state parliament

According to the corrected result, the CDU has 41 seats and the AfD 40. The BSW has 15 seats, the SPD 10, the Greens 7. The Left has 6 seats and the Free Voters won one direct mandate. There are a total of 120 seats in the Saxon state parliament.

Several parties and experts from “Wahlrecht.de” had previously assumed that the state election officer might have made a mistake in the new seat distribution. This was initially reported by the “Leipziger Volkszeitung”.

State Election Commission: Software previously worked perfectly

“Based on information, we checked the calculation, identified the error and manually recalculated the seat allocation,” the German Press Agency said in response to a request. The state election commission cited a software error. The electoral law was changed in 2023. Since then, special software has been used to calculate the seat allocation. This was intensively tested in advance.

It worked flawlessly during the local elections on June 9. No errors occurred during election tests for the state elections either. The IT service provider is working on analyzing and correcting the error.

According to the preliminary results on Sunday evening, the CDU received 31.9 percent (2019: 32.1 percent). The AfD is just behind with 30.6 percent (27.5). The BSW achieved 11.8 percent from the start. The SPD landed at 7.3 percent (7.7). The Left Party slipped dramatically to 4.5 percent (10.4). The Greens received 5.1 percent (8.6). The FDP again missed out on entering the state parliament with just 0.9 percent (4.5) – as in the last two state elections. There were no changes to the preliminary result of the state election.