The Dutch Netherlands went to the polls on Wednesday in a snap national election brought by anti-mass-migration populist Geert Wilders as he seeks a fresh mandate to push through border control reforms.
Geert Wilders’ Party For Freedom (PVV) is projected to come first once votes are counted from Wednesday’s snap national election, but the burning question is whether it will be with enough seats and enough potential coalition partners to keep the left out of power.
The PVV came first in the previous national elections two years ago, but like many European nations, Dutch politics is fragmented, with no single party out of dozens competing for seats capable of dominating parliament. This leaves the formation of governments to delicate coalition-building that follows the vote, which can take many months. It can also create unusual results that, at first glance, appear to be against the will of the voters.
Despite that first-place position last time, Mr Wilders’ party had to go into government with three others, each with their own priorities. An early sign of coming instability, one demand of the supporting parties in return for supporting the coalition was that Mr Wilders himself — the leader of the largest party in the Dutch Parliament — could not be Prime Minister.
As it was, a little more than a year after the coalition was agreed, it collapsed, brought down by Mr Wilders withdrawing his party and accusing the others of backsliding on migration controls agreed by all at the start. Speaking at that time in June, Wilders said: “We have not signed for a cabinet where only asylum seeker centres will be added. The PVV has been very reasonable and patient over the past year, but as of today, the gloves are going off.”
Whether those centre-right parties that had supported Wilders before will do so again after this election is yet to be seen, whether his PVV comes in first place or not. Immigration is a hot-button topic in the Netherlands, and nobody speaks on it with more authenticity than Wilders, which he hopes will benefit him at the ballot box today.
Anything less than a convincing win for Wilders could leave the door open to a rainbow coalition of the many small left-wing parties to form an ‘Anybody but Geert’ government. Indeed, former European Commissioner Frans Timmermans who leads the main leftist party in the Netherlands has said Dutch people should elect him to “finally put an end to the Wilders era”.
Geert Wilders has lived under constant police protection for over 20 years, thanks to his outspoken criticism of Islam, never sleeping in the same building, unable to return home and generally wearing a bullet-proof vest in public. Earlier in this election cycle, he was forced to suspend campaigning because of another Jihadi plot against his life.
Read the full article here