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Final remarks

I’ve been to busy to do any reporting, but if you followed the polls page you’ll know that the SP has lost a lot of voters to the PvdA, which throws the race on the left wide open and changes the coalition landscape considerably.

The cause was PvdA leader Samsom’s excellent showing in the TV debates, while SP leader Roemer disappointed. I just saw the final debate, and have to agree. I will still vote SP, though — I don’t trust the PvdA.

The reason I don’t trust the PvdA is Purple. In recent polls the pure Purple coalition, VVD+PvdA+D66, has gained a majority. Immediately all political pundits started to talk about its chances, which are indeed fairly decent.

Everyone now concentrates on centrist coalitions such as Purple, or a forbidden coalition of PvdA, CDA, and VVD. I still do not believe in the latter, but Purple could become a serious option. But there are two important points:

Purple will be a disaster for PvdA and VVD because they’ll be forced to compromise with each other, which will cause renewed attacks from the flanks, SP and PVV. So I don’t understand why either party would want to go Purple.

The prime-minister race has changed from Rutte vs. Roemer to Rutte vs. Samsom. But if we get both in government anyway, why bother to choose between them. Obviously Rutte and Samsom officially deny any interest in Purple and each other, but still ...

The only other real option is centre-left: roughly PvdA+SP+D66+CDA. The problem here is that D66 has clearly indicated it does not want a coalition with extremist SP. We’ll have to see if that’s still the case tomorrow evening, but if it is we have a problem. And D66 would not mind Purple at all.

It’s going to be a long formation.

<— My grand theory of Dutch politics | Preliminary election results —>

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