ANPNSC party leader Pieter Omtzigt at a members day of his party yesterday
NOS Nieuws•vandaag, 07:45
A week and a half before the elections, it seems that the 2023 campaign will go down in history as the ‘prime minister’s question’ campaign. Pieter Omtzigt (NSC) has not yet given a clear answer. Will he or will he not run for the highest office?
Mark Rutte (VVD) was Prime Minister for thirteen years. Logical, because his party was the largest party all along. And Rutte wanted nothing more. He consistently called the premiership the “best job there is”.
Until even he was done with it. After the last elections, in 2021, Rutte came under fire because of the ‘function elsewhere’ issue, which revolved entirely around the man who now dominates the campaign: Pieter Omtzigt, then a CDA member.
Rutte played a greater role in that matter than he had previously said, which is partly why confidence in the prime minister plummeted. It was a turning point, he later explained, that led to Rutte unexpectedly announcing that he was quitting after the fall of his fourth cabinet.
Exceptions to the rule
The normal course of events is that the leader of the largest party becomes the Prime Minister after the elections. But there are exceptions. For example, Piet de Jong was not a party leader for the KVP (which later merged with the CDA) in 1967, but he eventually became prime minister when his party became the largest.
In 2003, Wouter Bos was party leader for the PvdA, but just before the elections he put someone else forward as prime minister candidate: Amsterdam mayor Job Cohen. By the way, he did not become prime minister. The PvdA became the second party and Jan Peter Balkenende of the CDA was able to form his second cabinet.
In the run-up to the upcoming elections, BBB party leader Caroline van der Plas presented former CDA State Secretary Mona Keijzer as a prime ministerial candidate. That was very relevant at the time, because the BBB could become the largest. According to the most recent polls, this is no longer the case, partly due to the rise of NSC.
Two weeks ago, Rutte admitted that the work of a prime minister is “really grueling”. “You have to be on all day, be sharp”, even with jet lag or after a late-night meeting.
And that is exactly why Pieter Omtzigt has doubts. After the ‘function elsewhere’ issue, he ended up at home with a burnout. And in recent weeks he has repeatedly said that he also has to take his family into account. He and his wife care for four children.
After the fall of the cabinet, Omtzigt doubted for a long time whether he would start a party at all, due to the pressure that this entailed. And once that decision had been made, the next question was already on the table: do you want to become Prime Minister?
Political reporter Xander van der Wulp:
“It is an unusual situation. Omtzigt now actually says: ‘Only after the elections will it become clear who our prime ministerial candidate will be. I would rather not be that, but if the situation arises in which I am called upon, then perhaps I will think about it again.’ That’s a gamble, because in fact he asks voters: ‘Just trust me, and if you don’t, then vote for someone else.'”
Maybe he also does that a bit from the idea: then I won’t become the biggest. Because that doesn’t seem to be necessary for him. He already indicated something like this in the beginning and it feels like a great responsibility for him to perhaps become the greatest. For the time being, voters do not seem to mind that he does not give a clear answer. And that is also unusual. That is really because of the person Omtzigt, who they apparently trust will do everything differently.”
2023-11-11 06:45:01
#Doubts #Torentje #unusual #bother #voters
