Wilders big winner of Dutch EU elections

[Brännvin]

http://www.nrc.nl/international/arti...h_EU_elections

The Party for Freedom of the populist politician Geert Wilders becomes the second biggest party representing in the Netherlands in Europe

Geert Wilders and his populist Party for Freedom (PVV) appeared to be the big winners of Thursday's elections for European parliament in the Netherlands. Exit polls released soon after the Dutch voting stations closed at 9 p.m. on Thursday evening predicted he would get four of the 25 Dutch seats in the European parliament, making the PVV the second largest of all Dutch parties in Brussels.

Wilders, who has become popular in the Netherlands running on an anti-Islam and anti-political establishment platform, promised voters he would be tough on immigration and criticised Turkey's bid to join the EU. "Should Turkey as an Islamic country be able to join the European Union? We are the only party in Holland that says, it is an Islamic country, so no, not in 10 years, not in a million years," Wilders said.

The other party in the Netherlands to be strengthened by these elections is the left-wing liberal - and most outspoken pro-European party in the Netherlands - D66. It grew from one to three seats in the European parliament. The boost for these two parties showed that Dutch voters are moving to the fringes of the political spectrum.

Labour, one of the three parties who make-up the ruling coalition government in the Netherlands, suffered a blow and lost three of its seven seats. The Christian democrats, prime minister Jan Peter Balkenende's party, looked set to retain five of their current seven seats.

Voter turnout was at 40 percent, a fraction higher than in 2004, the last time Europe-wide elections were held.

Only the Dutch and the British voted for the EU parliament on Friday. The other 25 EU member states will go to the polls over the weekend.

European rules say countries are not allowed to release the results of the elections until all polling stations across the bloc close on Sunday evening, because results from other nations could influence those who have yet to vote. However, the Netherlands stress the importance of transparency and the fact that today's results from the municipalities are provisional. The official result from the Netherlands will only be announced on Sunday evening.

Then Elfichka, just go all out on the most expensive bottle of champagne that you can afford as well as strawberries, cheese, and crackers.

[sturmwalkure]

Yay, I hope to hear similar good news from Austria, Belgium and other countries too soon. Go go Geert! Go go Geert! Go go Geert!

[Brännvin]

This video done two days before the result is quite interesting to say the least.

[youtube]KuCtv4mm1b4[/youtube]

[Treffie]

Good days!

I just hope that us Brits have the fortitude to do the same!

[HawkR]

At least something is moving forward And yeah, let's hope UK will follow the same path. In a matter of fact, let's hope all of Europe does

[Jamt]

Congratulations, big time Netherlands!

I think and hope that after the elections are over in Europe things might change a bit for the better. Remember that even so called pro immigration politicians are first of all politicians, and they want to stay in power. If the results are anything like NL in a handful of other European countries it should be a good thing indeed.

[Brännvin]

Here a graph showing the predicted votes of 2009 in comparison to the results of 2004, where the PVV had not even a representative, that's impressive.



Same will happen in other countries of Europe as well sooner or later, if possible, it happens during these European parliamentary elections, since the mainstream parties do not offer any possibilities for people critical of multiculturalism and mass immigration to get their voice heard.

One of the reasons why the victory of Geert Wilders and the PVV were politically important, yesterday.