2006 Dutch general election

The next Dutch general election will be held on 22 November 2006 after the fall of the cabinet Balkenende II, and will follow the interim minority cabinet Balkenende III .

Issues at stake

Like the elections of 2003 the most important question of the elections is which one of the two largest parties, the social-democratic PvdA or the Christian-democratic CDA, will become the larger. The largest party will have the initiative in the cabinet formation talks. Furthermore, if it becomes part of the cabinet, the largest party in practice always supplies the prime minister. Only when the largest party is kept outside the cabinet, other parties supply the prime minister, which did not happen since 1989. The media have framed the elections as a 'Clash of the Titans' between prime minister Jan Peter Balkenende (CDA) and candidate prime minister Wouter Bos (PvdA). The CDA has, unlike it did in 2003, not yet expressed that it prefers to govern with the liberal VVD, although the VVD is part of the coalition Balkenende III and prefers another coalition with the CDA. The PvdA has consciously left its options open, expressing no preference for his three options: a centre-left CDA-PvdA coalition, a purple VVD-PvdA coalition and leftwing PvdA-GL-SP coalition.

Events leading up to the election

In the month before the fall of the cabinet two parties held internal elections on who would lead their parties in the next elections, which were scheduled for 2007. In the internal election of the liberal VVD the more liberal secretary of state for science and higher education Mark Rutte beat the more conservative minister without portfolio for immigration and integration Rita Verdonk. In the internal election of the social-liberal D66 the more radical democratic minister without portfolio for government reform Alexander Pechtold beat the more social-liberal chair of the parliamentary party Lousewies van der Laan.

The next Dutch general election was originally scheduled for May 15 2007 as the parliament was to be dissolved on April 2 2007. However, it was announced that elections will be held on 22 November 2006,^[1] as Prime Minister, Jan Peter Balkenende, has offered the resignation of the cabinet on June 30 2006 after one of coalition partners, D66, withdrew their support from the cabinet the day before over Rita Verdonk's treatment of the Ayaan Hirsi Ali case. A new cabinet now continues as a care taker cabinet.

After the fall of the cabinet several new small rightwing parties announced that they would run. Most of these parties either came out of the remains of Pim Fortuyn's List Pim Fortuyn (LPF) or the liberal VVD. In the period before the elections the small right was characterized by a chaos of secessions, new formations and party switches. Former Rotterdam alderman Marco Pastors and member of parliament for the LPF Joost Eerdmans who formed Eén NL. Party for Freedom led by former VVD MP Geert Wilders. Party for the Netherlands led by former LPF minister Hilbrand Nawijn. Nawijn and Wilders currently form one man parties in parliament, while Eerdmans is still part of the LPF. Two other LPF politicians have formed one man parties but they have not formed their own party: Gerard van As former leader of the LPF and Gonny van Oudenallen, also former LPF. Margot Kraneveldt left the LPF, returned her seat to the party and joined the social-democratic PvdA . Anton van Schijndel, a conservative liberal has recently left the VVD, but he has not yet announced which party he will join. Meanwhile the LPF has announced that it will also run the next elections, under the name "Fortuyn". The party will be lead by Olaf Stüger, who served as member of parliament between in the period 2002-2003 and returned to parliament in 2006, to replace Gerard van As.

Both Femke Halsema, leader of the GreenLeft, and Jan Marijnissen, leader of the Socialist Party (SP) have advocated a leftwing bloc of SP, GreenLeft and the social-democratic PvdA. This idea was called the "Left-wing Spring" (Linkse Lente), a term first used by the GreenLeft. Wouter Bos, leader of the PvdA, always distanced himself from this idea, claiming that the PvdA should not bind itself to a particular party before the elections. In 2004 and 2005 the polls indeed indicated that the united left would gain a majority in the Tweede Kamer. The current polls predict two head-to-head races. One between the PvdA and ruling CDA and another between the left-wing bloc (PvdA, SP, GreenLeft) and the right-wing bloc (CDA, VVD) with neither gaining a majority.

Several prominent politicians have announced they will step back before the elections. Some commentators have spoken of a large exodus. Within the liberal VVD former chair of the parliamentary party Jozias van Aartsen has announced he will retire, as will his vice-chair Bibi de Vries, as will Frans Weisglas the current speaker of parliament. As will ministers Hans Hoogervoorst, Sybilla Dekker, state secretary Melanie Schultz van Haegen and Henk van Hoof. Within the CDA ministers Cees Veerman and Karla Peijs have announced they will not return, as has state secretary Clemence Ross. Both D66's current chairperson Lousewies van der Laan and her predecessor Boris Dittrich have announced they will not return.

Turkish-Dutch candidates and the Armenian Genocide

On September 26, 2006, a candidate for the Labour Party, Erdinc Sacan, was removed by his party, because he would not hold to the party stance that the Armenian Genocide was caused by the Young Turks. That same evening, the CDA announced that two of their candidates, Ayhan Tonca and Osman Elmaci, have been removed as well, because of the same issue. Both parties agreed that all their members should openly conform to the party's point of view on this sensitive human rights issue. The sensitivity over this issues was underlined when the speaker of the Turkish parliament, Bülent Arınç, in response threatened the Netherlands with diplomatic action over this incident. Namik Tan, spokesperson for the Turkish Department of Foreign Affairs said that "we are deeply worried about the one-sided approach of our ally Netherlands’ political parties on the so-called Armenian genocide as this puts a limit on the freedom of expression."

Greenpeace interference with CDA party congress

The CDA party held its party congress on September 30. During a speech of parliamentary chairman Maxime Verhagen, activists of Greenpeace rolled down a large sign saying "CDA chooses for 240,000 years of nuclear waste," referring to the news a day earlier that the CDA junior minister of the environment Pieter van Geel is open to new possibilities for nuclear energy in the Netherlands. Four activists were apprehended by the police afterwards. Minister of the Interior, Johan Remkes (VVD), said in parliament on October 3, that organizations that disturb political meetings, might be struck from their government subsidy. He called the Greenpeace action "totally irresponsible behaviour." Greenpeace in reaction states that it does not receive any government money, and that they would like to talk with Remkes about "the safety of CDA congresses and nuclear power plants."

Voting issues

Voting machine controversy

A report by action group Wij vertrouwen stemcomputers niet details serious security flaws in the Nedap voting machines used in the election. The report was made public which was described by the national TV program EenVandaag . It proved to be surprisingly easy to open the case of the voting machines. The inner casing around the electronics was only protected by a very simple lock. Thus replacements of software and even hardware were relatively easily possible (by a simple memory chip swap, meaning that the memory that holds the voting data is not encrypted). Voting machines manufactured by Nedap cover 90% of the voters in the Netherlands. Another machine is made by SDU and called "NewVote". It is based on a PC and uses a touchscreen instead of buttons. Both systems lack a paper trail, thus, when doubting the outcome a non-electronic recount is not possible. Only ten small districts still use paper and pencil.

Wij vertrouwen stemcomputers niet has threatened to bring minister Atzo Nicolaï to court since they are not convinced by his assurances that there will be no fraud in the upcoming election. In response to the allegations, Nicolaï introduced new security measures for the voting machines. . Currently Nedap is checking all its machines for tampering, is installing new chips and software that is less easily hacked, and seals the machines with an unique metal seal . Based on inspections, on October 30^th the government decided that there was a problem with SDU voting machines, due to the fact that within a radius of 10 meter the machines could be wirelessly monitored, so that these machines could not guarantee anonymity of voting to a sufficient degree. These machines, which are in use in 35 municipalities, including Amsterdam, have to be improved or replaced with an alternative before the elections . Many municipalities, including Amsterdam, decided to switch to the traditional pen and red pencil method of voting instead of the SDU machines.. Machines made by Nedap are still in use.

Experiments

Two experiments will be conducted during this elections: "Stemmen in een Willekeurig Stemlokaal (SWS) or the 'voting in a random polling-booth'-experiment and "Kiezen Op Afstand" (KOA) or the 'voting from a distance'-experiment, also called the internetvote-experiment.

Public debates

Radio debate

The first public election debate between the leaders of the seven largest parties was held on October 29, 2006, on public radio. Mark Rutte, whose VVD is junior partner in the third Balkenende cabinet of CDA prime-minister Jan Peter Balkenende, was worried that the CDA will choose for a coalition with the PvdA after the elections, as this, at the time of the debate, was the only two-party coalition possible according to polls. Balkenende, however, kept his options open, and did not rule out a coalition with the PvdA. The PvdA's Wouter Bos stated that he will not become a deputy prime-minister in case Balkenende leads a CDA-PvdA coalition. He will then remain as chairman of the parliamentary party.

RTL 4 debate

This debate took place on November 3, 2006 and was televised by RTL4. Participants were Jan Peter Balkenende and Wouter Bos. In an opinion poll conducted by TNS-Nipo following the televised debate, 50 procent of respondents thought Wouter Bos won the debate, against 46 procent for Jan Peter Balkenende.

Upcoming debates

• 11 November (NOS): Jan Peter Balkenende (CDA), Wouter Bos (PvdA), Mark Rutte (VVD) and Jan Marijnissen (SP).
• 15 November (NOS): participants to be announced.
• 21 November (NOS): participants to be announced.

Parties and top candidates

• Christian Democratic Appeal (Christen-Democratisch Appèl), led by current Prime Minister Jan Peter Balkenende;
• Christian Union (ChristenUnie), led by André Rouvoet;
• Democrats 66 (Democraten 66), led by former Minister for Government Reform & Kingdom Relations Alexander Pechtold after the 2006 D66 leadership election;
• GreenLeft (GroenLinks), led by Femke Halsema;
• Labour Party (Partij van de Arbeid), led by Wouter Bos;
• Fortuyn (old List Pim Fortuyn, now "Fortuyn"), led by Olaf Stüger;
• Party for the Animals (Partij voor de Dieren), led by Marianne Thieme;
• People's Party for Freedom and Democracy (Volkspartij voor Vrijheid en Democratie), led by Mark Rutte, who was elected in an internal election;
• Political Reformed Party (Staatkundig Gereformeerde Partij), led by Bas van der Vlies;
• Socialist Party (Socialistische Partij), led by Jan Marijnissen;
• Group Wilders (Groep Wilders - Partij voor de Vrijheid), led by Geert Wilders.
• Eén NL, led by Marco Pastors

Turnout

As voting has been voluntary in the Netherlands since the elections of 1971, not all voters use their right to vote. Thus, the turnout is always significanty less than 100%. Parliamentary elections score between 70% and 90% turnout, with the 2002 election having a 79% turnout.

Of the estimated 600,000 Dutch citizens living abroad (about 5% of all eligible voters), who have to register to be allowed to cast their vote, only 30,000 (about 0.3% of the voters) registered. Due to this low rate of registration, votes of the Dutch living abroad will have a negligeable effect on the outcome of the elections.

Polls

The latest Politieke Barometer (PB)^[2], the main poll by NOVA and Interview-NSS, and the TNS-NIPO polls (TN) by RTL4 ^[3] yield the following results:

Party	2003 (%)	2003 seats	TN Oct 30, 2006 seats	PB Nov 6, 2006 (%)	PB Nov 6, 2006 seats	TN Nov 6, 2006 seats
CDA	28.6	44	38	28.8	45	39
PvdA	27.3	42	38	27.8	43	35
VVD	17.9	28	27	15.2	23	24
SP	6.3	9	23	11.3	17	25
LPF	5.7	8	0	0.2	0	0
GL	5.1	8	6	5.1	8	7
D66	4.1	6	1	1.6	2	1
CU	2.1	3	8	3.2	5	8
SGP	1.6	2	2	1.9	2	2
Wilders/Freedom Party	0.0	0	4	1.8	2	6
PvdD	0.5	0	1	1.0	1	1
EénNL	0.0	0	1	1.6	2	1
Others	0.8	0	0	0.5	0	0

Possible coalitions	Orientation	2003 seats	TN 10/30/06	PB 11/06/06	TN 11/06/06
PvdA-CDA	(center-left)	86	76	88	74
CDA-VVD-CU	(chr. center-right)	75	73	76	68
PvdA-SP-GL-CU	(Christian-left)	62	75	73	74
CDA-VVD-D66	(center-right)	78b	66	70	64
CDA-VVD	(center-right)	72a	65	68	64
PvdA-VVD	(Purple)	70	65	66	59
PvdA-SP-GL	(left-wing)	59	67	68	67

^a Current minority cabinet ^b Formed after 2003 elections, fell in June 2006 ^c Bold numbers indicate majority coalition

Trivia

• The CDA party congress was ended by The Beatles song "All You Need Is Love".
• The PVDA party congress was ended by the Marco Borsato song "Rood" (Red).
• The VVD party congress was ended by Mick Jagger song "Let's Work".
• Filemon Wesselink, presenter of the (political) television program Lijst-0 for the youth channel BNN was elected #30 on the D66 candidate list. Wesselink tried in the program to become a candidate for various political parties, secretely taping each party's interview process. Although a candidate for D66, Wesselink withdrew himself from the list.

External links

• Template:En icon Dutch Electoral Council
• Template:Nl icon Nederland Kiest (Holland Chooses) Election news by the Dutch public broadcaster NOS.
• Template:Nl icon Parlementsverkiezingen 2006 (Parliamentary Elections 2006) Election news by RTL Nieuws, the main commercial broadcaster in the Netherlands.