With four-way competition in the polls, it is becoming urgent for other parties to intervene

Since 2002, it has not happened that a sitting prime minister does not participate in elections. And that gives a different dynamic to the election campaign, as it appears now that almost all party leaders have presented themselves to the voter. VVD member Mark Rutte leaves a gaping hole in the ‘political middle’.

“Everything is possible,” D66 party leader Rob Jetten told his supporters hopefully on Saturday afternoon during the campaign kick-off in Zwolle. For D66, which according to polls is in danger of losing significantly, this seems to be hoping against better judgement. But the lesson of 2002 is that after the announced departure of a sitting prime minister, voters look for new guidance. At the time, the CDA seemed to be on the verge of death, but it became the largest in a campaign tarnished by the murder of Pim Fortuyn. Note, with a completely unknown party leader: Jan Peter Balkenende. It is a lesson that Jetten’s CDA colleague Henri Bontenbal (in a poll by I&O Research, the party is in danger of only having three seats left) also clings to.

Each party knows that the playing field is open. Even the VVD knows that it is not a given that the Liberals will once again become the largest without Rutte on November 22.

During the past elections, parties emerged on the left and right flanks that opposed Rutte and the politics he stood for. Now that Rutte is gone, parties are beckoning to the voters who previously voted for him. Voters who Rutte managed to retain in 2021 by presenting themselves as a ‘doer’ and not as a ‘screamer’, and who did not want to exchange experience for an unknown face during the corona pandemic.

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Many parties are angling for their favor. And at least four are doing so successfully for the time being: the VVD, Pieter Omzigt’s new party New Social Contract (NSC), the left-wing collaboration GroenLinks-PvdA and the BBB. They all present themselves as the voice of the voter in the middle. They all copy Rutte’s role by calling for less division. A message that should go down well with voters in the middle who mainly want stability, socio-economically often tilt slightly to the left (in favor of a decent welfare state) and culturally slightly to the right. And that is a large group according to pollsters.

It is no coincidence that party leader Dilan Yesilgöz emphasized on Friday at the kick-off of the VVD election campaign that the asylum policy must be stricter and that something must be done about people’s social security. Omtzigt and BBB leader Caroline van der Plas claim the same themes, who constantly emphasizes that her party ‘is not left or right, but a broad middle party’. And Frans Timmermans (GroenLinks-PvdA) also made social security a spearhead of the campaign and said that his supporters must stop with doomsday stories about the climate and that the voter in the middle must be convinced in order to become the largest.

With the four-way battle emerging in the polls, it is becoming urgent for the other parties to intervene, especially for the traditional middle parties. D66 leader Jetten also emphasizes that he wants to stop ‘climate drama’. He said on Saturday that it is time ‘for a new generation’.

And CDA member Bontenbal is also trying to distinguish himself in this way. He says that his party has drifted too far from its principles and must return to the old story: looking out for each other and a sense of community. At the same time, the party wants to radiate a new beginning. The top of the list of candidates presented on Saturday consists, just like Bontenbal, of new faces, such as number 2 Eline Vedder.

Meanwhile, parties that profile themselves on the flanks are having a difficult time. On the left, the SP is under pressure and the radical BIJ1 is in danger of simply disappearing. On the right, JA21 thought it could fill ‘the gap on the right’ in 2021. It now has to fight the image of yet another party that implodes due to arguments.

This also applies to BVNL, which, like JA21, split from Forum for Democracy and then split again. With party hoppers such as Henk Krol (once 50Plus) and Harry Wijnschenk (once LPF) on the list, the party of Wybren van Haga (who was also a member of the VVD) hopes to return to the House of Representatives. The party currently has zero seats in the polls.

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