Our Dutch correspondent H. Numan sends this follow-up on the process of trying to form a government in The Netherlands after Geert Wilders’ electoral victory last month.

Frans Timmermans: ‘Hello, Ursula [von der Leyen]. Can I get my old job back?’

A small but significant victory

by H. Numan

After his stunning electoral victory, Geert Wilders is continuing the offensive. He scored another and a just as significant victory. The position of Speaker of the House was coming vacant. The no. 3 in the PVV party, Martin Bosma, won that election. He is now the new Speaker. After years of muslim women holding the gavel, it’s now an evil racist patriarchal oppressive white man! Not my opinion, of course, but that’s how the left sees it. Quite literally. The more progressive they are, the more insults and false accusations they utter.

Martin Bosma is well-liked and respected, by both left and right. He was deputy Speaker, and appreciated for his management of the House. The previous Speaker was Firouz Alida Chaouqui; she performed under her artist name ‘Vera Bergkamp’. Her father is Moroccan, and she holds — you’d never guess it — two passports. Her tenure was abysmal. We don’t have many civil servant strikes in The Netherlands, but she managed to get her civil servants to go on strike and nearly revolt. Apart from that she was partisan, vindictive and couldn’t maintain order in the House. The reason why this incompetent nincompoop became Speaker is obvious. She had the most pity points: D66 member, dual nationality, mohammedan, has a lesbian partner and two children.

The one before her was also a mohammedan, Khadija Arib. She was more competent, and a Labor party member. Of course dual nationality, the correct faith and plenty of pity points. She had to leave office in disgrace because her successor very capably got her in trouble. What exactly isn’t terribly important here. The case is pending, and basically swept under the rug, after her inglorious departure. Now it’s Martin Bosma’s turn.

This is a very significant victory, for Bosma and the PVV, because it broke the anti-PVV boycott. Most parties tried to keep the PVV at bay by boycotting them at every opportunity. Most PVV motions were denied. Usually a member of a boycott party would slightly rephrase the motion, to get it passed. Making it blatantly obvious that the motion was justified, but the carrier was not.

Every position a PVV member tried to qualify for was given to someone else. Even if they had to dig one up for it. Two reasons for the boycott: it happens to nearly all new parties that are even slightly controversial, or marginally anti-establishment. D66 was indirectly boycotted for several years before it became accepted. And, of course, because the PVV stands diametrically opposed to what the establishment wants.

As you might expect, the left is furious. Their candidate Tom van der Lee got substantially fewer votes. They were sure he would make it, even though van der Lee was deeply involved in the Oxfam child sex scandal. We don’t know (yet) if he dipped his wick in something he shouldn’t, but he certainly knew about it and did everything he could to sweep it under the rug. The usual whining doesn’t work anymore. More like the opposite: it shows the grapes are very sour. Especially Green-Left (ex communists) are very vocal about racists, fascists and more of that. The parties that voted for Bosma and got him is majority were the VVD and NSC.

Now, that doesn’t say everything is all right now. Far from it. Both party leaders very much wanted something else, but they simply couldn’t get it. There is real pressure inside their parties to put up or shut up. As I said before, the party elites would much rather have a communist-conservative coalition, but they stand alone. Supposing they do decide to go ahead and block Wilders, it’s the end of their careers and their parties. That happened before with the once-mighty Christian Democrats and the equally powerful Labor party, who both willingly and eagerly went woke and are now broke. The CDA is now almost a fringe party with five seats, and Labor had to merge with the Communists to save at least something. So don’t be surprised if Pieter Omtzigt (NSC) and Dilan Yesilgöz (VVD) go woke after all. It has happened before.

Another positive sign is that Wilders suggested that Ronald Plasterk did a great job and can become informateur. He was scout, looking for possibilities to form a cabinet. Just scouting. Nothing formal. To appoint an informateur is the next step. Essentially the same, but more formal. Parties now will start negotiating in earnest. Especially when points of view differ widely, that can take a very long time. In this case they do differ widely, but are forced to at least try. It’s likely negotiations will take several informateurs. The next step would be a formateur, that is, the man who will dot the i’s and cross the t’s. That is still in the future. I also expect Plasterk to resign from his party and join as a minister the PVV party. But that is also in the future.

Both the VVD and NSC party leaders openly doubted they could form a coalition with the PVV. That means they have to show their hand. The same goes for Wilders, but he is in a much better position. It’s easy to boldly state you don’t want to work with racists who hate poor innocent peace-loving muslims, but the facts are different. Muslims aren’t innocent and certainly not peace-loving.

The PVV doesn’t want to round up all muslims, and ship them immediately back home. That’s the mantra of the left. In reality they want only muslims who have a criminal record and dual nationality deported, which is reasonable. If international treaties forbid that, it’s time to have a close look why we should abide by those treaties. As much as progressive parties like to pretend, those treaties are not chiseled in stone.

Those islamophobic worries are biting the left in the buttocks; now we have to upgrade our terrorism warning level because of … islamic terrorism. Nothing phobic about it. It’s remarkable how events can change the election results. In 2017 a Turkish minister was kicked out of the country by Mark Rutte who because of that won the elections. Now it works the other way around!

Even Hamas is doing its very best to help Wilders. The spectacular rise of the PVV party began immediately after the 7 October massacre. Our elites do what they can to show their anti-Semitism, but it’s not working anymore. The mohammedan mayor of Arnhem, Ahmed Marcouch, allowed police officers to wear religious headdresses; he explicitly included kippahs. Despite his ministry, the government and the law does not allow that. Most people now joke he allowed kippahs because it’s so much easier to find Jews that way. A journalist did an inquiry, and found out there are… zero… police officers who even want to wear a kippah. In Amsterdam and The Hague the mayors allowed pro-Hamas demonstrations with Hamas and ISIS flags, but anyone with even a Israeli lapel pin was sent away by the police ‘for their own protection and safety’. All that did was to encourage more people to vote for the PVV.

We’re not there yet by a long shot, but I’m beginning to get a little bit more hopeful.

— H. Numan