New Entries Into Crowded Field Blur Election Picture

The outlook for the upcoming general election on 22 November was already unclear, with a crowded field of parties and a new crop of leaders for some of the Netherlands' largest parties lending an air of uncertainty. The past few days have seen the entry of two more candidates that could blur the picture further.

• On 20 August Pieter Omtzigt - a lawmaker formerly part of the centre-right Christian Democratic Appeal (CDA) - announced that he would run with his own political party, the New Social Contract. Omtzigt gained prominence in 2021, raising the issue of a child benefit scandal that eventually led to the collapse of the Rutte III gov't. He is running on a 'good governance' platform.
• On 22 August the alliance between the social democratic Labour Party (PvdA) and the environmentalist GreenLeft (GL) elected European Commission First VP Frans Timmermans as the alliance's prime ministerial candidate.
• The outlook for the election was already unclear, with four-term PM Mark Rutte resigning as head of the centre-right People's Party for Freedom and Democracy (VVD), while the heads of the CDA, PvdA, D66, DENK, and BIJ1 have also stepped down.
• A hypothetical poll by Peil.nl carried out 18-19 Aug showed that an Omtzigt List would win a plurality of 27 seats. Omtzigt has stated that if his party wins a plurality they would look to sit in gov't, but he would not seek the PM's office. The crowded electoral field allows for the possibility of a shift leftwards or rightwards from the Dutch gov't post-election depending on the coalition formation.

Source. Peil.nl, Ipsos, I&O, MNI