Far-right leader Geert Wilders won the parliamentary elections on Wednesday. His Freedom Party, anti-European and anti-Islam, now has 37 seats out of 150. In the streets of Amsterdam, reactions are mixed.
Published
Reading time :
1 minute
:quality(50)/2023/11/23/epaliveseven173771-655f972a49ab6007484967.jpg)
In the Netherlands, the Freedom Party of Geert Wilders, far-right, anti-European and anti-Islam leader, won the legislative elections on Wednesday November 22 with 37 seats out of 150. Results which do not leave indifferent in the streets of Amsterdam.
Ellsine is delighted with Reert Wilders’ good score, the elegant sixty-year-old woman believes that there are too many immigrants in her country. But it was not the candidate’s anti-Islam diatribes that won her over. She is even relieved that he has somewhat tempered his speech for the benefit of his social program: “Yes, I voted for him! This is what he wants to do for people, for the old, the young, for purchasing power, housing and health… And let him not be remained too radical!” Mégan is 20 years old, with a smile on her lips despite her worry. She voted for the left and still says she hopes for a turnaround if Wilders fails to form a coalition: “Now we will wait to see how things work out with the other parties because one of the left-wing parties has also made good progress. So I remain hopeful!”
Extreme voting exacerbated by current events
Oassime is Syrian, a refugee in the Netherlands for eight years. He studied, he works, he has Dutch nationality and for him, this vote sounds like a slap in the face: “I’m Muslim and so I feel a little publicly discriminated against. I’m a citizen of this country and I’m afraid for freedoms. It starts with Islam and then maybe after that it will affect another religion. Here’s what I think…”
Charlène is a Frenchwoman, living in the Netherlands for around ten years. For her, the subject of migration is a concern that is not new in Dutch society, but current events have exacerbated the extreme vote. Her husband Romain is perplexed about the place that the Netherlands could occupy in Europe. “This morning, he said, we questioned the seriousness of a possible referendum on the country’s exit from the European Union.”
