Paul Kirby,Europe digital editorand
Anna Holligan,Hague correspondent in Leiden
Reuters
Initial exit polls had put D66 Leader Rob Jetten (left) in the lead, while Geert Wilders’ Freedom Party has lost ground
Rob Jetten’s centrist-liberal party D66 are in a neck-and-neck race with anti-Islam populist Geert Wilders in the Dutch election, according to almost complete results.
With almost 99% of votes counted, both D66 and Wilders’ Freedom Party were heading for 26 seats in the 150-member parliament, a projection from Dutch news agency ANP said on Thursday.
Initial exit polls had put Jetten in the lead. “Millions of Dutch people have turned a page; they’ve said goodbye to a politics of negativity,” he told supporters.
A downbeat Wilders had earlier conceded the result was not what he wanted, having lost 11 seats, but said he had still achieved his second best result ever.
But as the final results trickled in on Thursday, the race became so close that the lead flipped between the two frontrunners.
Then, the last preliminary results came in from the capital Amsterdam and Rob Jetten’s liberals moved significantly ahead by more than 15,000 votes.
Both parties were below 17% of the national vote, and three other parties were not far behind, including the conservative-liberal VVD on 22 seats, followed by the left-wing GreenLeft-Labour party and the Christian Democrats.
Wilders led the polls throughout the election campaign, but after he pulled the plug on his own coalition in June in a row over asylum and migration, all the mainstream leaders made clear they did not wish to work with him again.
He admits he has little hope of forming a government himself, but said on X on Thursday that if his party did top the vote he should have the first try. Even without a clear-cut victory, Jetten – who staged a remarkable campaign – would stand a stronger chance of leading the next administration.
Only a few weeks ago, the polls put D66 – a party formed by democratic reformers in 1966 – on just 12 seats.
But the photogenic, 38-year-old liberal leader capitalised on polished performances in a succession of TV debates and interviews.
The fact that he also competed in a TV quiz show called The Smartest Person in the weeks leading to the vote only added to his public profile.
EPA
Rob Jetten, 38, led a highly polished campaign and outperformed his rivals
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