The progressive liberals of D66 won the elections in the Netherlands this Wednesday, ahead of the far-right Party for Freedom (PVV) led by veteran Geert Wilders, 62, and which is suffering a collapse compared to the last elections. According to the first exit poll, published by public television, the former would obtain 27 seats out of a total of 150, compared to 25 for the ultras. It is a scenario full of uncertainty, but it seems feasible that future negotiations will end up leading to a moderate Government led by the socioliberals, with their young leader Rob Jetten, 38 years old.
Although Wilders had led the polls since the electoral advance was confirmed, the rest of the parties had closed the gap in recent days. To the point that an Ipsos poll published on Tuesday pointed to a three-way tie in the lead, with the center-left slightly ahead. Just over 13.4 million citizens had the right to vote.
The recently concluded election campaign has been tense, and has been dominated by immigration and asylum, housing and the cost of healthcare. Uncertainty has remained until the end, with high indecision among voters.
If the exit polls are confirmed in the next few hours, Wilders could have reached the limit of his possibilities, remaining – once again – on the verge of being prime minister in the face of the general veto of the moderate forces, which seem to be strengthened on this occasion. Leading a Government was the greatest desire of this openly xenophobic veteran politician after almost three decades as a deputy in Parliament.
In 2023, when the ultra won comfortably, with more than 23% of the votes and 37 seats, the Government emerged from the pact between four right-wing forces headed by Wilders’ own group. It was his great opportunity to demonstrate that he was up to the task of government. However, that Executive was only able to remain in power for 11 months. It was he himself who blew it up, by not getting the strict asylum laws he advocated, blaming his right-wing partners.
This unstable and chaotic stage has made the attributes of moderation shine again. Aside from the great victory of the night, D66 with its young leader Jetten, the Christian democracy of the CDA, for example, has gone from being obscured to the point of practical irrelevance to making the principles of decency and responsibility it advocates permeate the political debate. However, some last-minute statements by its leader, Henri Bontebal (42 years old) about the primacy of freedom of education even if it clashed – in orthodox centers – with the constitutional prohibition of discrimination, caused him to retreat in the polls.
The alliance between social democrats and environmentalists has also managed to emerge, despite the resistance that its candidate, the former vice president of the European Commission Frans Timmermans (64), arouses in the Netherlands that has been shifting to the right for years. That could have taken its toll on him: he has resisted relatively well, but everything indicates that he will be far from D66.
In the Netherlands, 0.66% of the vote is enough to obtain a seat. Hence the great fragmentation: in the last elections, in 2023, up to 15 parties achieved parliamentary representation. This Wednesday there were 27 formations on the ballot, although not all of them were presented in all the constituencies of the country.
Agreeing on a coalition can be a slow, tedious and bumpy process. The third and fourth governments of the conservative Mark Rutte – today Secretary General of NATO – took 225 and 299 days, respectively. And the current outgoing Executive, headed by Dick Schoof, needed 223 days of negotiations. Nothing to do with what was common decades ago: the fastest formation to date was achieved in 1948, when in just 31 days the social democrat Willem Drees managed to form a Government.
This Friday, when the scrutiny is completed – although the electoral board will not publish the final result until November 7 – the first meeting between party leaders will be held and an explorer will be appointed. He will be the person in charge of analyzing the type of coalition proposed by the formations. The report of these consultations will be sent to Parliament before the deputies take office.
