Who is Geert Wilders? The far-right leader whose shock election win has sent a chill across Europe

The anti-Islam, anti-immigration, anti-EU politician is now closer to seizing power than ever before, after two decades as a political outlier. writes Tom Watling

Dutch far right Party for Freedom (PVV) leader Geert Wilders is constantly flanked by security personnel (Reuters)

Outside a dull-coloured bar tacked onto a street corner in The Hague one Wednesday evening in 2014, a man that would come to be nicknamed the ”Dutch Donald Trump” issued a warning.

Addressing a crowd of his excited followers, Geert Wilders promised to “arrange” for the removal of Moroccan migrants from the city and from the Netherlands, having got thise gathered to chant they wanted fewer Moroccans in he country.

The comparisons with Trump come from Wilders inflammatory rhetoric and use of social media. But that 2014 incident landed him in court. In 2016, he was convicted of insulting people of Moroccan ancestry and inciting discrimination. In 2020, an appeals court dismissed the allegations of inciting discrimination, saying the chants had been provoked for political gain. An allegation that Mr Wilders incited hatred was also thrown out.

In 2021, the Dutch Supreme Court upheld that 2020 ruling. "Even a politician must abide by the basic principles of the rule of law and must not incite intolerance," judge Vincent Van den Brink said in his verdict. "With that statement he offended an entire group of people ... in this case because of their descent," he added. Wilders did not receive a fine or jail time.

It was not the first case Wilders had faced. In 2011, a judge in Amsterdam said remarks made by the politician against Islam were "gross and denigrating" but acquitted Wilders of inciting hatred against Muslims saying the statements were "acceptable within the context of public debate".

Geert Wilders, leader of the Party for Freedom, known as PVV, casts his ballot in The Hague (AP)

Before that, in 2009, Wilders was denied entry to the UK, where he had been due to show his 17-minute film Fitna, which denounces the Quran. Then-home secretary Jacqui Smith said his presence had the potential to "threaten community harmony and therefore public safety". The ban was overturned on apeal later that year.

Fast-forward a few years and Wilders’ Party For Freedom (PVV) has received the most votes in this year’s general election. With nearly all votes counted, the PVV is forecast to win 37 seats in the 150-seat lower house of parliament, more than double the 17 he won at the last election.

The result will send shockwaves through Europe and puts Wilders in line to lead talks to form the next governing coalition and possibly become the first far-right prime minister of the Netherlands.

“I had to pinch my arm," a jubilant Mr Wilders said after hearing the result. Beyond his stance on Islam, the EU will also be alarmed that part of Wilders’ pitch to voters was a referedeum on leaving the bloc. Even if Dutch voters are not persuaded to follow Britain out of the EU — polling suggests it’s unlikely — Wilders will be unbowed in his Euroscepticism. If Wilders takes a seat at the EU table, it will be a boon for hardline leaders such as Hungary’s Viktor Orban and a blow for unity of the bloc,

A reveller takes a picture of a carnival float depicting US president Donald Trump with Marine Le Pen, Geert Wilders and Adolf Hitler, reading 'blonde is the new brown' (AP)

Born in 1963 in southern Venlo, close to the German border, Wilders grew up in a Catholic family with his brother and two sisters.

After spending a year in Israel following his graduation from secondary school, he claims he found a “special feeling of solidarity” for the region and its Jewish foundations. He has professed to returning to Israel at least 40 times since.

Wilder’s extreme views, such as comparing the Quran to Mein Kampf, he has said were fuelled by the assassination of the radical anti-Islam film-maker Theo van Gogh in 2004.

Those views have made him a target. In 2008, he was listed as the most threatened politician in the Netherlands.

Wilders has been constantly accompanied by plain clothes police officers in public for years. He does not receive visitors in his government office unless they are cleared in advance and he lives with his wife in a state-provided house with a panic room inside and outfitted with bulletproof windows.

Convicted Norwegian mass murderer Anders Behring Breivik has expressed admiration for Mr Wilders (AP)

His office is also allegedly located in the most isolated corner of the Dutch parliament building and was chosen because people can get to it through only one corridor, making it easier for bodyguards to repel an attack.

He began his political career as a speech writer in the 1990s. He specialised in foreign policy writing and travelled extensively throughout the Middle East.

Wilders is set to become the longest-serving lawmaker in the Dutch parliament later this year. He has been a member of the House of Representatives since 1998, first for the center-right People’s Party for Freedom and Democracy (VVD).

After party spokesman on foreign affairs in 2002, Mr Wilders became more outspoken on Islam. He became increasingly at odds with his party over these views. In the summer of 2004 when he published a pamphlet arguing against the accession of Turkey, a largely Muslim country, to the European Union.

The VVD had backed the move and previously warned him against speaking in opposition to it. A month later, Wilders left the party.

An eclection campaing poster of Geert Wilders' PVV party is removed in The Hague this morning (Copyright 2023 The Associated Press. All rights reserved)

In 2006, he created the Groep Wilders Party, later renamed the Party for Freedom. The following year, they won 9 out of the 150 parliamentary seats.

In 2009, he declared for the first time in public that he wanted to become prime minister.

“At some point it’s going to happen,” he said, “and then it will be a big honour to fulfil the post of prime minister.”

The most seats his party held prior to this election, was 24 in 2010, which made it the third largest party in the Netherlands.

That was the last time that Wilders came close to governing, in supporting the first coalition formed by then-Prime Minister Mark Rutte in 2010. But Wilders did not formally join the minority administration and brought it down after just 18 months in office in a dispute over austerity measures.

Political analysts have noted that Wilders has had to soften his anti-Islam rhetoric to win over the electorate over the past year.

On Wednesday night, with the results coming in, Wilders said he “understood very well that parties do not want to be in a government with a party that wants unconstitutional measures.”

He added: “We are not going to talk about mosques, Qurans and Islamic schools.”

Wilder’s political history suggests this will not be the case.