That’s strange, did I miss something? Was there an election and I didn’t notice?
Not likely, since I live and breath this stuff. But the way Dutch politicians are talking these days, it sure feels like we just had an election, and a new government is being formed.
See, in Holland elections don’t mean too much. The kind of government that comes out depends on back-room negotiating after the elections are over.
That’s because this country has so many political parties (eleven in the current parliament), that two or more have to get together to govern. That happens behind closed doors, and can take months. (There’s a good overview of Dutch politics here.)
After the last election two years ago, it went pretty quickly. Reps for the three parties escaped to a mansion way up in the northern province of Friesland to hammer out a deal.
Just three months passed between election day and the new cabinet taking office. (Read that agreement here.)
But now they’re at it again. Not in Friesland. This time talks are taking place in the Prime Minister’s office -the ‘Little Tower’ - and in his residence, both right here in The Hague.
Why new talks, if there’s no new government?
Crisis. The economy has tanked so badly, promises made two years ago can no longer be met. Everything’s been thrown open, the knives have been drawn, and the parties have gone to the mattresses. (Who else misses the Sopranos?)
And we journalists are forced to hang around for hours waiting for the 7 negotiators to emerge. When they do, they don’t say anything. At least, not on purpose.
It’s a game of parsing words and reading faces.
Why do we in the press even bother? Because when these 7 negotiators are done, some major changes will take place, affecting everyone in this country.
Democracy. Don’t you just love it?
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on Mar 10th, 2009 at 1:14 pm
John,
With all due respect to political correspondents like yourself, I’m afraid you’re all suffering from a common misconception: that politicians say things “by accident.”
You say you had to wait seven hours for the politicians to emerge from their closed door negotiations, only to find their lips tightly sealed when they came outside. Politicians “don’t say anything. At least, not on purpose.”
The truth is, practically everything politicians say these days is absolutely ON PURPOSE: in fact, it’s been whispered into their ear by a spin doctor. They’re always on message, which is why no one trusts them anymore. What politician speaks from the heart these days? Who EVER speaks off the cuff?