GETTY Patience is running out in Germany over immigration

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In a nightmare scenario for German chancellor Angela Merkel, her oft-repeated phrase “we can do it”, in relation to absorbing hundreds of thousands of migrants, has been widely derided. A YouGov tracker poll revealed how two out of three Germans don’t agree with the phrase, which now haunts Mrs Merkel, as the country creaks under the pressure of waves of newcomers.

GETTY Karl-Georg Wellmann criticised the German chancellor

Political opponents like the anti-immigration party Alternative for Germany (AfD), have also thrown the soundbite back in her face and garnered huge numbers of new supporters in the process. A YouGov poll showed how 66 per cent of those polled did not agree with Merkel’s boast, up from 51 percent last September. The growing resentment towards the German leader could threaten her grip on power, with elections set for autumn next year. As her authority ebbed away Mrs Merkel was even criticised from within her own Christian Democrats party, with MEP Karl-Georg Wellmann saying: “Many of our voters understand it as if we could, indefinitely, continue to take in more people.

Many of our voters understand it as if we could, indefinitely, continue to take in more people MEP Karl-Georg Wellmann

GETTY AfD's Alexander Gauland was cheered when he spoke out against migration

“Chancellor Merkel might not even mean to say that, but this is how it’s being perceived — and that’s why people I meet in my constituency tell me that they are just sick of hearing that sentence.” AfD deputy leader Alexander Gauland received a rapturous reception at a rally in August last year when he yelled: “We don’t want to do this, at all.” At the time the party was polling at just three per cent, by June this year it had surged to 14 per cent. The inability of Germany to integrate the influx has also caused concern, with the shock revelation this week that the top 30 German companies had employed just 54 migrants. More than one million migrants arrived in Germany last year, with a third of them refugees from Syria.

GETTY Angela Merkel faces a tough test at elections next year