Back to square one: government formation in the Netherlands stagnates | International

The Dutch Parliament gave the green light this Wednesday to the search, across the national political spectrum, for a new government coalition for the Netherlands. This decision responds to the failure of negotiations led for almost three months by far-right leader Geert Wilders and his Party for Freedom (PVV), winner of the November 22 elections. He failed to find an agreement with the three other right-wing parties which obtained the most votes: the liberals (VVD), the New Social Contract (NSC) and the Peasant-Citizen Movement (BBB). Given the situation, a new mediator has been appointed to overcome the current blockade. You have four weeks to survey all parties represented in Parliament.

Wilders introduced a motion to broaden the search for a government pact beyond election winners. The supervisor of this new phase will be the social democrat Kim Putters, president of the Economic and Social Council. This is the advisory body of the Executive on macroeconomics and it got to work this Wednesday. The alliance formed by environmentalists and social democrats (GroenLinks-PvdA), led by Frans Timmermans, former vice-president of the European Commission, considers the formula adopted by the majority after a long parliamentary debate as “a waste of time “. It seems more effective if the four right-wing groups continue to deliberate.

On the night of February 6, Pieter Omtzigt, leader of the NSC, abandoned the negotiations, arguing that he did not consider it possible to govern with Wilders. Even if he does not rule out providing some support from Parliament to the future coalition that could be formed, the decisive factor in his withdrawal was the lack of timely information on public finances for the next legislature. He considers that the forecasts are not good and does not want to make false promises to citizens. Parliament’s current mandate does not guarantee success, but it could clarify the type of government sought in the Netherlands.

The parliamentary debate was sometimes bitter. In others, allusions to the feast of Valentine’s Day, Latin phrases and quotes from Saint Augustine made MPs laugh, while MPs wondered what model of government could be agreed upon. The possibility of a majority government was raised, the most difficult to achieve at the moment. A minority party, with the support of Parliament from a party which does not participate in the coalition itself. And after the failure, for the moment, of a traditional coalition government, the option of an executive based on a program which would be developed by the parties which wanted to participate and which would be subject to the search for a parliamentary majority for its execution. Or an executive composed solely of technocrats. Faced with this range of possibilities, deputies of all stripes have continued to ask the leaders of the four parties who have negotiated so far without success to define themselves.

“The stifling policies of recent years have failed to solve the problems of the population and this is what has darkened the situation in the Netherlands in recent years,” Omtzigt said. “I did everything I could to ensure that the negotiations were successful,” Wilders said, before reaffirming his values. Although he assures that he will respect the Constitution and admits that Muslims in the Netherlands should receive the same treatment as other citizens, he said: “I still think that Islam is a reprehensible and hateful religion which provokes violence. Caroline van der Plas, president of the BBB, expressed her hope of “reaching an agreement”.

Dilan Yesilgöz, head of the VVD, who until now had only offered her support without entering the Council of Ministers, spoke out on Wednesday in favor of working “with a program of clear financial frameworks”. He also does not exclude that the future government includes people “from outside”, as long as there is “a fair representation of the four parties involved in the negotiations” carried out so far. Wilders described the new situation as an “intermediate phase” to clarify the type of government.

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