The frontrunner to succeed Angela Merkel as German chancellor has moved a step closer to the top role.

Armin Laschet is the 60-year-old leader of the Christian Democrats and he has won a key election in the country’s poorest state.

This recent victory is expected to ease doubts about his ability to lead Germany’s conservatives.

Winning this recent election with 37 percent of the ballots, the CDU was well ahead of the nation’s far-right “Alternative for Germany Party”, that secured 22 percent of the vote.

Berenberg’s chief economist says “the national CDU under Armin, now has momentum on its side”.

Laschet has promised to maintain CDU as the “force of the political middle ground”.

However, political analyst Oskar Niedermayer told AFP that the reality is that voters in the east tend to be “more conservative and more nationalist” than in the west.