To the surprise of many, it has been four years since the Forum for Democracy started The biggest It became a party in the provincial elections. Not much left of that profit. Among the eligible politicians of that time, a small group still proudly calls itself a FvD member, the rest have left.

Today the party is holding a conference, one of the themes of which is the provincial assembly elections in March 2023. The list of speakers now includes well-known names such as former Member of Parliament Paul Cliture and Forum for Democracy International Director John Loughland. .

“Thousands of members have already registered,” party leader Boudet says in a conversation with NOS. “They’re people who have been members for years, but we’re also attracting new groups like Yoga Rite.” He had to laugh until the end.

Baudet is not too concerned about the exodus of parliamentarians and MPs in recent years. “I don’t know if it would have been so different,” he says. “There is always a phase of decline with a new party.”

On March 20, 2019, more than one million Dutch people voted for the Forum for Democracy. The party got 86 seats in the provincial assembly. Now only 24 Members of Parliament are in office. twenty-fifth seat (Temporary) in the hands of FvD MP Kerseboom, a member of parliament who left the party due to maternity leave.

In the Senate elections of the same year, the FvD won twelve seats. Of these, only one FvD member still occupies: John DesingAlso a member of the North Holland States.

“Robert Baljeu and I worked very hard on the list of candidates at that time,” recalls FvD co-founder Henk Otten. “We were looking for solid and reliable people who we wouldn’t mess around with. We’ve had a big hit, but they’re all with JA21 now.” Otten and Baljeu joined the party after the election It worked.

“Maybe they thought we didn’t exist, it wasn’t me,” Baudet says of politicians who have now left the party. “They’ve done something different than anything I’ve ever wanted to do.”

Otten is still proud of that day’s campaign and election results. But on election night, he got the shock of his life. “That Borial speech by Boudet, I left the room with tears in my eyes. He screwed it up.” Otten thinks people started to leave from that point on.

It really was A speech Minerva’s owl and raised eyebrows with incomprehensible statements about the boreal world. After that, the anti-Semitic and racist messages that leaked from members of the youth wing drove a lot of people away, as Baudet did not want to distance himself from it.

This year the provocations followed one another even more rapidly. From justifying Russia’s attack on Ukraine to throwing punches from the United States and the United Kingdom Conspiracy theories About reptiles. A succession of denials and weakness made it of little value, as Baudet repeated the same statements.

The remaining FvD MPs feel noticeably supported by Baudet as he issues one threatening statement after another. Tribunals or overturning Tyrant Rules. Those statements no longer lead to arguments.

In a foreword to the 2021 budget to be debated today, the party leader says of the eighteenth split: “After this latest split, a new phase has begun for the party – indeed the first time in our existence – that we can build unhindered by internal conflict.”

Baudet creates a movement of like-minded people who, like himself, are disgusted with today’s society. He wants change through politics, but until that happens “that’s how we think life should be”.

Forum Country, Forum Schools, Forum Glossy and Digital Forum World should create a “pillar” or “parallel community” in society, which Baudet already mentioned in his victory speech in 2019. “We are now launching an app for members at the conference,” Baudet says proudly. The aim is for members to find each other through the app for vacancies, products and entrepreneurial connections. “For example, for a discount at a cafe or restaurant.”

Four years ago it was still changing politics, Otten says. Now the FvD agenda is focused on “undermining Dutch democracy,” he says. “He turned it into a cult around him.”

Baudet doesn’t think he’s drifting away from society. “Everyone is free to join us and taste the forum spirit.”