Poll boost for anti-Islamist leader

DUTCH anti-Islamist leader Geert Wilders scored major gains in local authority polls yesterday, making him a serious challenger for power in a June national election, preliminary results showed.

In the first test of public opinion since the collapse of prime minister Jan Peter Balkenende's coalition government last month, Wilders' Freedom Party (PVV) led in the city of Almere and was second in The Hague.

The results came on top of an opinion poll showing that the PVV, which campaigns against Muslim immigration as its main platform, would win the most seats – 27 in the 150-member Dutch parliament – in the election on 9 June.

The PVV has been pitching its policies to a nation of 16 million turning increasingly inwards as the economy struggles and social tensions rise.

There are nearly one million Muslims in the Netherlands.

Andre Krouwel, professor of political science at Vrije University in Amsterdam, said: "You can see there's a lot of discontent in the electorate. Clearly, Wilders is going to use these results as a stepping stone for national elections."

Mr Balkenende, who is currently heading a caretaker government, saw his coalition collapse on 20 February after his centre-right Christian Democrats failed to persuade their Labour Party partners to extend the Netherlands' military mission in Afghanistan.

In Almere, the PVV won 21 percent of the vote to Labour's 18 percent, the preliminary results showed. In The Hague, the PVV had 8 seats – second to Labour with ten seats. Experts put turnout in the local elections at 56 per cent.

Mr Wilders is due in the House of Lords today on an invitation from the UK Independence party for a screening of his anti-Islamic film, Fitna.