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Wilco Bum
Political journalist
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Wilco Bum
Political journalist
Disagreement arose in the PvdA over the composition of the list of candidates for the new Senate, which will be elected next May. The party’s national leadership has partially deviated from the draft electoral list drawn up by a party committee headed by Job Cohen.
Two candidates – current Senators Ruud Koole (former party chairman) and Hamit Karakus (former councilor in Rotterdam) – withdrew from the list this week. The party council wanted to place Koole and Karakus in an ineligible position, while the party committee had placed them in an eligible position. Several party sources confirmed this to NOS today.
For example, the party council moved Ruud Koole from second to eighth place and former mayor and Senator Ferd Crone from tenth to sixth place. Koole’s low stance in particular is notable; as former party president, he saved the PvdA after the big defeat in 2002, following the assassination of Pim Fortuyn. Job Cohen is dissatisfied that the party’s advice has deviated from the advice issued by the nomination committee under his leadership.
Cohen declined to comment further on the matter. He confirms that the party council will be responsible for explaining the list of candidates to the electoral congress and not the nomination committee, as is usually the case.
“Happiness but also sadness”
In the list drawn up last Monday by the party council, the current party chairman Mei Li Vos is in first place, just like four years ago.
Current Senator Jeroen Recourt is in second place and PvdA Friesland party chairman Hetty Janssen is in third place. Groningen economist Randy Martens is in fourth place, Senator Mary Fiers is number five, and the aforementioned Crone is in sixth place. The PvdA now has six senators in the Senate.
The PvdA’s national party council says in a response that the party council compiles the list “carefully”. According to the council, “various considerations” play into this. “This leads to happiness in people, but also sadness in some people because they had hoped for more,” the party council said.
The PvdA will announce its new draft list of candidates tomorrow in The Hague. At the same meeting, GroenLinks will also present the draft candidate list, because the parliamentary factions of the parties want to form a single faction after next year’s elections. Members of the two parties will formally adopt the list of candidates in the electoral congresses to be held on February 4.
