(This article was written by Derk Jan Eppink and appeared in Wynia’s Week. Bizar liberaal geklungel in het Europees Parlement over strenger asielbeleid: wil de echte VVD nú opstaan?)
At the European Parliament vote on the return regulation for rejected asylum seekers, the four-person VVD delegation went down ignominiously this week. VVD delegation leader Malik Azmani was the main negotiator (‘rapporteur’) in parliament. A ‘rightist wind’ in Strasbourg and Brussels made his draft report stricter and sharper. United left was furious and Azmani bewildered. He abstained on his own report, while his three fellow VVD members voted in favor. Meanwhile, the D66 delegates voted against, even though Prime Minister Rob Jetten advocates stricter asylum policy in Europe.
At the VVD, the question now is ‘will the real VVD please stand up,’ while coalition partner D66 governs in The Hague, even provides the prime minister, but leads the opposition in the European Parliament.
Immigration discontent is more noticeable in Europe than in the Netherlands, which confines itself to the usual political dance steps in The Hague. Municipal council elections are behind us and the protest vote has coalesced through the emergence of local parties with the annoying ambition to stand up for their own citizens. The term populism is then the codeword.
In many municipalities, the local elections turned into a referendum on the Distribution Act, once launched by then State Secretary of Justice Eric van der Burg (VVD). Here too the trajectory proved to be that of a drunkard in liberal ranks. In December 2023, party leader Dilan Yeşilgöz tried to block that law with the remark ‘mark time.’ What did not prevent VVD senators from happily voting for the law in January 2024. In the Schoof cabinet, agreement was reached, in the presence of the VVD, to withdraw the Distribution Act. Which subsequently did not happen.
In the Jetten cabinet, the VVD seems to ‘tolerate’ this law, with the remark from faction leader Ruben Brekelmans that the Distribution Act is ‘provisionally needed to distribute the pressure.’ The VVD’s policy reversal on this point became a growth factor last week in The Hague for Richard de Mos’s party: a gain of seven seats (from nine to sixteen), while the VVD lost four (from seven to three). Here is the result of the ‘referendum’ on the Distribution Act.
In Europe, Azmani continued the flip-flopping. He began to ‘negotiate’ between left and right to achieve unanimous agreement on the return regulation. This is the successor to the return directive that came into force in 2008. The legal difference is important. A regulation has direct effect, like a law, and is immediately applicable. A directive is a European decision that EU member states must transpose and incorporate into their own legislation. With the latter, numerous interpretation differences often emerge so that asylum legislation became a European mosaic of legal rules that differ greatly. An oasis for lawyers from the asylum sector. That is why it was time for directly binding rules, via the return regulation.
The left-wing political factions (socialists, greens, and radical left) did not want to know about it. They were put under pressure by seventy NGOs who acted as subsidized shock troops for the old asylum order. Azmani’s liberal faction was also largely opposed, especially the French followers of President Emmanuel Macron. Azmani was too generous with softener in his compromise proposals. He fell between the cracks.
Meanwhile, Azmani’s co-rapporteur, French right-liberal François-Xavier Bellamy from Versailles, set to work with the German Christian Democrats who are under heavy pressure in their own country due to excessive immigration. They pulled the draft to the right and won the vote, partly thanks to the European conservatives (including the SGP and BBB) and the Patriots for Europe faction (including the PVV and Viktor Orbán’s party).
Result: 389 in favor, 208 against, and 32 abstentions, including rapporteur Azmani who did not vote for the report bearing his name. The rest of the VVD delegation did. The caravan moves on. In June comes the ‘trilogue’: negotiations between the European Parliament and the Council of Ministers under mediation by the European Commission over the final version of the return regulation. There is haste. The Jetten cabinet will undoubtedly agree. Regardless of the D66 delegation in the European Parliament.
What is left of the real VVD? A few weeks ago, journalist and historian (meanwhile doctored) Dik Verkuil presented his biography of VVD leader Frits Bolkestein in whose cabinet I worked at the European Commission.
It has become a comprehensive and complete life description (776 pages) and perhaps Bolkestein was one of the last Mohicans in Dutch politics about whom a proper biography can still be written. Earlier figures were prime ministers like Joop den Uyl, Ruud Lubbers, and Wim Kok. Also Mark Rutte? Time will tell.
Dutch politics revolves too much around morality; in other countries (and also the EU) it is about power, often ‘pur sang.’ Azmani experienced that. He tried—undoubtedly with good intentions—to keep all larger factions together with a ‘compromise’ for a substantial majority; a European dream. But the ‘momentum of power’ has also shifted in Europe. ‘Realpolitik’ suppresses ‘Idealpolitik.’
The German Christian Democrats are under such great pressure that the return regulation became the perfect opportunity to introduce stricter migration policy. Germany stands on the brink socially and economically. So does the Netherlands, but the political elite does not (yet) understand it. The German Christian Democrats also received support in the vote from the villified Alternative for Germany (AfD). Plus votes from delegates of the villified Hungarian Prime Minister Orbán. In the Bundestag, Christian Democrats barely look at an AfD member. As if a ‘contact prohibition law’ applies. But in the European Parliament, the German Christian Democrats carry the day, if necessary with the ‘far right.’ That escaped Azmani; not Bellamy.
Tightening migration legislation is more than necessary. Currently, one in five rejected asylum seekers is expelled; four in five remain. That has an enormous drawing effect. The Distribution Act will not help either, and our new Housing Minister, former air force general Elanor Boekholt-O’Sullivan (D66), speaks in The Guardian about housing shortages in the Netherlands without identifying the main cause: immigration.
Immigration remains the core problem. Whoever does not see that misses the mark. Recently, Danish Social Democratic Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen called early elections, assuming she would win by a landslide after the row with Donald Trump over Greenland. But she lost and booked her party’s worst result in over a hundred years. She resigned. The Danes were not concerned with Greenland, but with immigration, even though Denmark has Europe’s strictest immigration model. The winner was the right-wing People’s Party of former European Parliament member Morton Messerschmidt, with a sharpened migration plan. Messerschmidt, a man with the fury his surname suggests.
The political divide between left and right, with ‘pro-immigration’ or ‘anti-immigration’ as the main theme, is anchored in Western Europe. The belated handling of the issue gives it the dimension of a cultural struggle that cuts deep tracks through the political-cultural landscape.
Next year there are presidential elections in France. Migration is the main theme between left and right; both political fronts are organizing themselves. In the second round, a left-wing and right-wing candidate loom: neck and neck. The polarization can take such violent forms that chaos ensues. That is why Bellamy was in a hurry with the European return regulation.
The idea that Azmani could serve as a bridge between left and right on immigration was well-intentioned negotiating in Europe, but entirely illusory. He would do better to pass the baton to Bellamy because he knows what is coming. The French presidential elections are heading toward a European cultural struggle, fought out in ‘deep France.’
Derk Jan Eppink is a Distinguished Fellow (Honorary) at the Gold Institute for International Strategy, a Washington D.C.-based foreign policy and defense think tank.
