Major news events have somewhat overshadowed the CDA report on the dramatic election defeat. But that will soon be made up for in September, when the CDA is forced by its members to hold a congress about the disastrous developments in the party. Then the supporters will decide how to proceed with the once so powerful club, which successfully kills itself. Of the already paltry fifteen parliamentary seats, only slightly more than half are left in the polls.
The report of former minister Liesbeth Spies is devastating for many CDA members, but especially for the party. Explosive internal quarrels, camps that are at each other’s deaths, an impotent party board that piles error upon error, and an invisible party leader have brought the CDA to the brink of collapse. “This time the CDA has lost itself”, is the sober but hard conclusion of Spies. The election campaign was a drama, there was a complete lack of cooperation between party leader Wopke Hoekstra and number 2 Pieter Omtzigt. Each candidate conducted his own campaign, whether or not with the election slogan ‘go ahead now’.
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Hoekstra’s team had come up with that slogan, but CDA members did not recognize themselves in it. It didn’t make sense either; there was nothing to get through at all. You do it when you’re already on the right track and still need a boost for that last push to victory. Like a cyclist who passes one opponent after another and only has the leader in front of him. He has to keep going to win the ride. But the CDA was and is not in such a position at all. The party hangs at the tail of the pack and must do its utmost not to be released. ‘Take care of each other’, as the election program was called under Hoekstra’s predecessor Hugo de Jonge, fits the CDA much better.
It is not the only fault of Hoekstra, the man who considers himself more of a director than a politician, but still accepted the leadership. After his appointment, he surrounded himself with people of his own who had little affinity for the CDA. He praised his number 2 in word, but not in deed. After the takeover, Omtzigt was no longer a running mate, but just one of the many candidate MPs. Hoekstra did nothing to win over Omtzigt’s supporters, who were already extremely critical because their man had not become the party leader. He was too busy with a pointless commercial.
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And whoever thought that everything would be all right after the elections, has to conclude that that has not happened. Hoekstra has not yet done anything to restore unity in the CDA. After the release of the Spies report, Hoekstra reacted as if he wanted to start over: “We will have to operate as one team again; I look forward to contributing to that with our group.” It hasn’t happened yet. But meanwhile, do lecture others. “It is a big mess at your party,” Hoekstra recently said in a debate with PVV leader Geert Wilders, without looking at his own political movement.
Hoekstra was at a G20 meeting when Spies presented her report and was therefore unable to attend. Out of necessity, he limited himself to a written response. But now, a week later, we still haven’t heard from Hoekstra. While his party is in turmoil. The critical supporters, united among others in the CDA Midvoor network, are surprised that Hoekstra is not covered in the report. Spies must have thought she’s brought up enough trouble already.
The drama of the election defeat has caused many victims. Party chairman Rutger Ploum immediately disappeared from the scene. The almost entire party board has resigned, Omtzigt has said goodbye to the party. But the man who is largely responsible for all the misery, says coolly that he will remain as party leader. Maybe he should sleep on that again.
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