Dutch voters set to give right victory in national vote dominated by economy, immigration

Dutch voters lean right on economy, immigration

AMSTERDAM — Voters appeared likely to shift the Netherlands to the right in national elections Wednesday dominated by concerns over the rising national debt and discontent over immigration.

The conservative VVD party under leader Mark Rutte holds a solid lead in opinion surveys, running on a deficit-busting, tough-on-immigration platform. The overtly anti-Islam Freedom Party of Geert Wilders, which wants a ban on all immigration from nonwestern countries, also appears set to book large gains, perhaps doubling its current strength in parliament.

A softer approach promoted by left-leaning parties, including former Amsterdam Mayor Job Cohen’s Labor Party, is unlikely to win a majority, though Labor is running second in polls and has made a late surge.

Cohen wants to preserve government social programs, raise taxes on the wealthy and make it easier for immigrants to integrate rather than punishing those that fail.

If the Dutch swing to the right, they would follow voters in Britain, who ousted the long-governing Labor Party last month, in Germany and earlier in France. Nationalist and anti-immigrant parties have been gaining force even in the traditionally open-door countries of Scandinavia.

Polls close at 9 p.m., and the state-funded NOS broadcaster will publish exit polls that in the past have proven to be within a few seats of the final result. The vote count will take several hours, as voters returned to paper-and-pencil balloting over worries about the reliability of electronic voting machines.

About 10 parties of the 24 that are fielding candidates are expected to win entry into the 150-seat Second Chamber, the legislative house of parliament. But in the fractured political scene, none is expected to come close to a majority, and a long period of political bargaining is likely to build a 76-seat majority coalition among three or four parties.

One possibility, however, is a minority government of right-wing parties, with outside support from the Freedom Party. No party is eager to join an alliance with Wilders because of his sharp, often polarizing anti-Islam politics and his leftist economic views. He is facing criminal prosecution for inciting hate after equating Islam to Nazism and calling for a ban on the Quran.

Various opinion polls agree on the pre-election trends. They give Rutte’s VVD about 34 seats in Tuesday’s poll, a huge gain from its current 22 seats. Cohen’s Labor Party is second with 30 seats, a drop of three. Prime Minister Jan Peter Balkenende’s Christian Democrats, which has led four governments since 2002, was likely to lose 15 or more seats from the 41 it has now.

The election was precipitated when Balkenende’s center-right coalition collapsed in February over the Labor Party’s refusal to extend the Dutch military mission in Afghanistan. Afghanistan has barely been mentioned in the campaign, which instead focused on traditional issues of immigration and the economy.

The VVD’s unexpected rise to the top of the polls is attributed to its promise to rein in spending and tackle a budget deficit that is rising rapidly this year above 6 percent of GDP while pledging not to raise taxes.

“This country spends too much. For a lot of people it’s better to collect social security than to work,” said Willem Bosma, 32, a civil servant and VVD supporter casting his vote in Amsterdam’s main train station.

Though his party is trailing, polls say Cohen is personally the most popular leader.

“He has been like a father to Amsterdam,” said Diane Padamsing, 52, a Surinamese-born housewife.

In a final televised debate Tuesday night, Rutte mocked one of Cohen’s signature lines — that it is the primary duty of an executive to “hold things together.”

Cohen won praise for his handling of a tense period in Amsterdam after the murder of filmmaker Theo van Gogh by a Muslim fanatic in 2004.

“The difference between you and me, Mr. Cohen, is that I don’t want to hold things together. I want to get things going,” Rutte said.

Cohen shot back that Rutte’s plans — including raising the retirement age, increasing health care costs and banning welfare for any immigrant for 10 years after arrival — were equivalent to electroshock therapy.

“You know what happens when you give an electric shock: there are great risks of crippling” the economy, Cohen said.

(This version CORRECTS graf 10, government collapsed in February, not March.)