(Bloomberg) -- The leader of Angela Merkel’s Christian Democratic Union issued an ultimatum to party members questioning her leadership, warning them to support or abandon her “here, now and today.”

“If you are of the opinion that the path that I want to take with you is not the one you consider to be the right one, then let’s discuss it today and end it today,” CDU party leader Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer told party delegates in Leipzig, Germany.

Her ultimatum drew a seven-minute standing ovation. Michael Kretschmer, the Saxon state premier who followed her at the podium, offered his support.

“Today we’re not going to end it -- today, we’re just getting going,” Kretschmer told the delegates.

A year after she was elected to succeed Merkel as party head, Kramp-Karrenbauer used the speech to push back against internal critics, saying fellow conservatives attacking the party’s record under the German chancellor are out of line. Conceding that the CDU had had a “difficult year,” the 57-year-old chairwoman mixed a speech that lasted an hour and 27 minutes with a range of policy detail and defense of her record.

AKK, as she’s known, urged members to focus on substance rather than debates over personnel -- code for the mounting opposition to her claim to be the party’s candidate when the time comes to replace Merkel as chancellor.

Party infighting is “not a successful election strategy,” Kramp-Karrenbauer told delegates at a congress in Leipzig, eastern Germany.

AKK, who once led the western German state of Saarland, won a tight leadership contest at last year’s party conference. But after a series of missteps, she is facing resistance to her claim to be the CDU candidate for chancellor when Merkel steps aside in 2021 at the latest.

The succession debate reflects a broader crisis in the CDU like those facing other European centrist parties seeing their poll numbers slide. Merkel’s party has lost voters to the far-right Alternative for Germany as well as the environmentalist Greens.Instead of resolving the issue of who would follow Merkel, Kramp-Karrenbauer’s stewardship has failed to unite the party.

That’s left potential successors waiting in the wings, including Friedrich Merz, who narrowly lost his bid to lead the party to Kramp-Karrenbauer at last year’s convention. Jens Spahn, Merkel’s health minister, is another possible contender, who has locked in support from the party’s conservatives.

(Updates throughout.)

To contact the reporters on this story: Patrick Donahue in Leipzig, Germany at pdonahue1@bloomberg.net;Arne Delfs in Leipzig, Germany at adelfs@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Ben Sills at bsills@bloomberg.net, Raymond Colitt

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