Posted on 03/07/2002 2:19:09 PM PST by knighthawk
A new right-wing party appears to have made strong gains in Dutch local elections, two months before the country votes for a new government.
Parties belonging to the national government coalition have lost about 12% of their regional seats, news agency AP reported.
The right-leaning Leefbaar Nederland (Liveable Netherlands) was the major winner, AP says, scoring landslide victories in some areas.
The movement has a strong anti-immigration agenda.
In Rotterdam, an outspoken former leader of the group is reported to have gained more than one third of the votes, making Leefbaar Nederland the largest party on the city council.
Anti-Muslim comments
Analysts say that the party - which was launched in 1998 - will now almost certainly win seats in the general election on 15 May.
Pim Fortuyn ran as the party's candidate in Rotterdam despite being ousted as its leader for making anti-Muslim comments.
He has since launched his own national party which will field candidates in the general election.
But other parties in Rotterdam have sworn not to share power with him.
Mr Fortuyn, a former sociology professor and outspoken homosexual, had to be escorted by police to the polling station to cast his vote as protesters demonstrated outside his home.
Low turnout
The turnout for the elections was 57.7% - slightly below the turnout of 58.9% four years ago.
In Eindhoven, a group affiliated to Leefbaar Nederland won nearly 19% of the vote.
The leading opposition Christian Democratic Alliance and the Greens also won small gains across the country.
The national government coalition consists of the leading Labour Party under Prime Minister Wim Kok, the Liberal VVD and the left-of-centre Democrats 66.
Fortuyn is gay. In case you didn't know, the nazis killed gay people like they killed Jews. The gays were brought into the death-camps with pink triangles on their clothes. Do you really think a man that is pro-Israel and gay would be a nazi?
The way you compare Fortuyn to Haider shocks me and also insults him, you are saying he is the same than the people who killed the gays and the Jews!
Do you really think I would vote for a man that is anti-Jewish?
Fortuyn doesn't seem to be anywhere near that. Apparently crime and an ineffectual police in Holland is a big concern, which the older parties, both right and left, essentially ignore.
NEVER MAKE MENTION OF HAIDER ON ANY OF MY THREADS AGAIN!
HAIDER HAS GOT NOTHING IN COMMON WITH FORTUYN!
But to a Dutchman central Europe is Holland, Germany, Belgium and France too. We view Europe more as the EU and the eastern Europe countries are left out of the picture. So if you say central Europe, we think the middle of western Europe
The source of the problem is the way Fortuyn is displayed in the leftist-controled media in Holland. 7 of the 8 national papers are owned by one source, and the national TV is portrying Fortuyn as a facist like Haider. But it's just propaganda. Here in Holland the national media is widely used by the VVD/PvdA to make their case. Also the extreme-left is doing everything to demonize him for certain things he said.
Fortuyn has said that Holland is full. And he also thinks that islam is a backwards religion (he wrote a book about the dangers of islam to our society) and he wants to stop ecenomical refugees from entering, but political one are still welcome. He is in no way a facists/nazi like the media want people to believe. The few here facists are going to vote for 'Green Right', which is a new party formed of CP'86, the party that was banned for it's facist sympaties.
The Left had gone so far to extreme, so loony, that there was and is simply nowhere to go, except to the right, or commit suicide.
As the USA prosecutes this war, Fortuyn is right in the center of where Europe is going: maybe he will rule the whole continent, not just Holland!
The rightist whirlwind will sweep Europe like a white tornado, and Muslims who cannot run fast enough will not survive.
And we complain about politics in our country.
Good question.
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