PIETER Omtzigt, one of the most popular conservative politicians in the Netherlands, has joined an already crowded field for elections later this year with the launch of his own party.  

The MP announced the formation of the New Social Contract (NSC) party in an interview published Sunday with the newspaper Tubantia, promising “a new way of governing”.  

Dutch voters will elect a new parliament on November 22 after this month’s collapse of Mark Rutte’s four-party coalition over plans to cut the number of relatives allowed to reunite with asylum seekers in the country.  

Polls taken before the NSC’s creation suggested that, if Omtzigt were to found a party, it could win the election.  

The 49-year-old former member of the Christian Democrats has been an independent since 2021 and has carved out a reputation as a politician of integrity.  

He sounded the alarm in a scandal in which thousands of parents were wrongly accused of child benefit fraud, which precipitated the resignation of Rutte and his third government in January 2021.  

Rutte, the country’s longest-serving prime minister, has said he will quit politics altogether after 13 years at the helm.  

His centre-right VVD party has not ruled out governing in a coalition alongside Geert Wilders’s populist nationalist Party for Freedom.  

This year’s poll also will see the established parties face a challenge from the Farmer-Citizen Movement (BBB), seeking to shake up the system.  

The BBB, formed after months of rowdy rallies against plans to cut livestock numbers for environmental reasons, won senate elections earlier this year. – AFP, August 21, 2023.