A new Dutch government took power on Monday, with the youngest ever Prime Minister and openly gay centrist Rob Jetten swearing in.
The 38-year old Jetten pulled a stunning election win, to replace the far-right Freedom Party with a thin margin. Jetten’s D66 has teamed up with the centre-right CDA party and the liberal VVD to form a coalition, but will fall nine seats short of a parliamentary majority, AFP reported.
Jetten is Netherland’s first openly gay and youngest ever Prime Minister. Soon after swearing in, Jetten, in an X post, said it is “an enormous honour to be able to get to work as prime minister.”
LGBTQIA organisation welcomes appointment
The Netherlands’ main LGBTQI organisation, COC, welcomed Jetten’s appointment. In a statement, the organisation said that the new premier can be a role model “for people from the rainbow community,”
“It shows that your sexual orientation doesn’t have to matter. That you can become a construction worker, a doctor, a lawyer, and even a prime minister,” AFP report quoted the statement.
Dutch national politics veteran who rose to power
A veteran of Dutch national politics, Jetten rose to the top of the political ladder nearly a decade after he won his first parliamentary seat in 2017 for the centrist, pro-European D66 party he now leads.
Born in southestern town of Uden, Jetten studied business administration and initially worked at a government-owned railway infrastructure company.
He is open about his life on social media and posts photos of himself and his partner, Nicolas Keenan, an Argentine field hockey star who won a bronze medal with his country’s team at the 2024 Paris Olympics.
Promised to finance defence
In his campaign, Jetten had promised to cut social benefits, including unemployment benefits, to help finance proposed investments in the military and defence.
However, since the coalition parties together hold only 66 of the lower house of parliament’s 150 seats, Jetten will have to negotiate with opposition lawmakers to find support for every policy.
