Dijkhoff does not want to succeed Rutte, Edith Schippers is also unavailable
VVD prominent and former party leader Klaas Dijkhoff is not available for the party’s list leadership. He has Monday night said at On 1following the announced departure of Prime Minister Mark Rutte as party leader earlier in the day.
Dijkhoff was considered a possible successor to Rutte for a long time, but left politics in 2021. He sticks to that decision, he said — despite the fact that his name scores high on lists of possible successors to Rutte as leader of the VVD in the upcoming elections. In a poll of One today Dijkhoff came out as a desired list leader among 90 percent of VVD voters.
“I am not available, no,” said Dijkhoff On 1. “I made my choice not to be a full-time politician. How I want to be a father, for example, I personally find incompatible with the image I have of what a prime minister should deliver.” Dijkhoff said a return to a full-time job in politics “is not in my plans for the next 14 years.”
It was also announced on Monday that Edith Schippers, VVD leader and previously a party leader in the Senate elections, is not available as a possible successor to Rutte. A spokesperson for the VVD senate party has said so in various media including RTL News, confirmed. Nine years ago, Schippers did have the ambition for party leadership. At the time there were speculations about a departure from Rutte to Brussels. Schippers would have wanted to succeed him in that case, but Rutte decided to stay in The Hague after all.
Welcome to this blog
Welcome to this blog. The Rutte IV cabinet fell on Friday and on Monday morning outgoing Prime Minister Mark Rutte (VVD) announced that he would leave Dutch politics after a new cabinet was formed. Foreign minister Wopke Hoekstra and party chairman Pieter Heerma, both from the CDA, have also announced that they are leaving politics in The Hague. At the VVD, the question is who will succeed Mark Rutte as party leader. Former member of parliament André Bosman has announced that he will stand for election as the party’s new list stretcher. Edith Schippers, a favorite for the VVD leadership, said she was unavailable.
In this blog we report on the latest developments surrounding the fall of the cabinet.
Read here back to the previous blog.