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DUTCH LIBERAL PRIME Minister Mark Rutte has today vowed to form a government quickly after receiving a solid mandate to battle the eurozone’s debt crisis at the expense of anti-EU populism.
His ruling VVD won Wednesday’s election with 41 seats, just two more than centre-left rivals Labour, while far-right leader Geert Wilders’ anti-Islam PVV party suffered a humiliating defeat after changing tack to attack Brussels.
“Tomorrow we get to work and the Netherlands must as quickly as possible have a stable cabinet and then I’ll start working with you so that the Netherlands can emerge stronger from the crisis,” Rutte told a victory party in The Hague late on Wednesday.
“We will not betray your trust,” Rutte said after his party won the most seats ever, an upset to a European trend that has seen governments toppled around the continent as the debt-crisis bites ever deeper.
The victory by Rutte’s VVD, closely followed by rising Labour star Diederik Samsom’s PvdA, means that the new coalition will be moderate and marks a victory for parties committed to debt-busting austerity.
The vote reflected the Netherlands’ commitment to its enduring relationship with Europe and will keep the eurozone’s fifth largest economy closely allied with economic powerhouse Germany.
“This is an exceptionally good victory because he (Rutte) is in charge of the biggest party in power,” Andre Krouwel, political analyst at Amsterdam Free University, said today.
“There are many European countries where leaders have lost elections in the middle of this crisis,” he said on state broadcaster NOS.
If the two main parties agree an alliance, the VVD and Labour would have 80 seats, a majority in the 150-seat parliament but the coalition would likely want more partners.
Geert Wilders, the head of the Freedom Party, in The Hague yesterday. (Photo: AP Photo/Jan-Hoseph Stok)
Coalition plans
Final results will be announced by the Electoral Commission later today, with coalition-building talks to begin immediately. But it will take weeks if not months for a new government to be agreed.
Nevertheless, VVD leaders have not yet publicly extended a coalition-building hand to the PvdA, and the VVD mayor of The Hague Jozias van Aartsen insisted it would be difficult for the parties to work together.
“There are two strong winners that are really very different from each other,” the former foreign minister told state-owned Radio 1 on Thursday.
Fiscally prudent Rutte’s government has been allied to German Chancellor Angela Merkel, while Samsom’s calls for stimulus echo those of France’s Socialist President Francois Hollande.
Both parties had lashed out at the EU status quo during campaigning, but the Dutch export-based economy could not afford to call into question membership in the bloc, where it sends 75 percent of its exports.
Samsom, a former Greenpeace activist and nuclear physicist, has enjoyed a stellar rise thanks to his success in televised debates, with opinion polls just a month ago predicting his party would win just 15 seats.
The more hard-left Socialist Party won 15 seats, as did Wilders’ PVV, a sharp drop from its previous tally of 24, results said with around 98 percent of votes counted.
Wilders, who brought down the last government in April after refusing to approve an austerity-driven budget, is not expected to play any role in this coalition.
“I’d rather have stood in front of you with good news,” a visibly shaken Wilders told his party’s gathering in The Hague, wiping a solitary tear from his eye. “In Brussels they are having a party… That’s a pity.”
The PVV vowed to pull out of the euro and the EU itself if they came to power. But many Dutch voters and the political mainstream decided that Wilders was simply unreliable.
Many Dutch citizens are fed up with bailing out indebted eurozone members while swallowing their own budget cuts, but voters had nevertheless been expected to shun anti-EU parties for the mainstream.
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Nice to see the people of the Netherlands largely rejecting Wilders.
What a creepy looking man. He could always get a job as an evil mastermind in the next Bond film…
The scary thing is how well spoken and logical he sounds. If he wasn’t so bigoted he would have actually been a viable candidate
I always thought he looked like a bizarre man/duck hybrid.
I agree Pieter. He was scary for a while, but isn’t gone just yet.
The media makes out that it is a massive decrease, however he still got 15 seats out of 150 in total or 10% of the seats. And he will be the main opposition now, along with the Socialist Party – which puts him in a good position for the next elections.
The Netherlands – Population 16.5 million …. MP’s 150. Irish Republic – Population 4.5 million …. TD’s 166. There’s something strange there ….
Good point. Crazy stuff.
There in lies our funding problem
In the Netherlands they reclaim land from the sea. In Ireland, we get the road “fixed”.
Now if the Greeks did likewise to their own knuckle draggers in New Dawn.
Dutch pragmatism and level headedness at work. However, it will be another indecisive government – but less so now that Wilders has been taken out of the equation.
It’s great to see the Netherlands sticking to its liberal heritage. The country was devastated by the Nazis after WWII, the PVV are not much better.
Are you saying that the PVV would have people shot?
The people doing the political killing in Holland lately aren’t the PVV…
The name Mohammed Bouyeri springs to mind – and he definitely wasn’t a member of the PVV.
I understand there is a militant Islamic section of Dutch society but didn’t Van Gogh believe in a liberal Holland? Putting the PVV in power would only escalate tensions between Muslims and the native Dutch.
Van Gigh did believe in a liberal Holland, and so did Pim Fortuyn, and they both died for it.
If Van Gogh didn’t want to “escalate tensions”, he wouldn’t have made Submission.
And if Holland really is liberal, he had every right to do so…
And not by the PVV’s hand…
Funny how it’s always the “natives” who are escalating tensions.
How about those “escalating tensions” by cutting off a man’s head in the street, or some lefty shooting a gay politican because he called Islam “a backward culture” and was against multiculturalism, or beating up gay people because your religion disagrees with them…
Eoghan – there will always be tensions in Holland, whether Wilders is a prominent political figure or not. The reason being that Islam is an innately intolerant religion and the Netherlands is an innately liberal,tolerant nation. I lived there for several years so I know what the situation on the ground is like rather than from afar.
Don’t get me wrong Neil, I’m not defending Islam. You only have to look at what happened to the American embassy in Libya to see what you’re dealing with.
If you did indeed live in Holland then I respect your answer.
Nice to see the Dutch reject populism
What does this mean for the ‘weed pass’? Any answer is much appreciated. Thanks
That would not be changed back. A lot of people here are mislead by the term Liberal. There’s not a lot of liberalism left with the VVD, they’re are right wing populists. You should have seen their election posters. Mostly slogans that would fit the PVV. It’s no wonder they are the biggest, they took a lot of ex-PVV voters away because of their populist stance.
But to come back to your question, it was the VVD that together with the PVV introduced this anti coffee shop law, so no chance in hell it will be turned back, unless the Dutch would see a significant reduction in their tourism.
Sam – my understanding is that if Wilders’ party had a successful election and were in the new government that the ‘weed pass’ would have proceeded as planned. There is uncertainty now. It depends on what parties form a govt. Mr Rutte’s party is quite supportive of the new system while the parties of the left oppose it. U will probably have to wait a week or 2 (at least) to see how this pans out.
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