BERLIN, March 22 (Reuters) - German Chancellor Friedrich Merz’s conservative Christian Democrats (CDU) held a lead over their centre-left Social Democrat (SPD) coalition partners in an election in the western state of Rhineland-Palatinate on Sunday, a forecast on public television showed.
The first forecast on the ARD broadcaster after polls closed showed the CDU at 30.5% of the vote, ahead of the SPD at 27%, pointing to a likely victory for Merz after his party narrowly lost an election in the neighbouring state of Baden-Wuerttemberg on March 8.
(Reporting by James Mackenzie, Editing by Friederike Heine)
