Photo: DPAGerman Chancellor Angela Merkel has returned from a three-week Alpine holiday to embark Saturday on what may be the most bizarre election campaign in the country's post-war history. After months of studiously ignoring the race for the September 24th election, Merkel will kick off a series of rallies across the country with an hour-long speech to supporters in the western city of Dortmund. Merkel's main challenger, SPD leader and former European Parliament spokesman Martin Schulz, has led what many commentators call a plodding campaign. Photo: DPA"The SPD can't polarise the campaign alone; the CDU doesn't answer, so (the campaign) is dying," said Lochocki. The CDU has plumped for a soft-focus campaign centred on patriotism and Merkel herself.

Source: The Local August 12, 2017 08:48 UTC