An eclectic government that includes the far right takes office in the Netherlands on Tuesday, led by a former spy chief and including a minister of agriculture who first tasted farm life on a reality TV show.
Prime Minister Dick Schoof, 67, is a political novice who emerged as the only palatable candidate for the four-way coalition that includes the Freedom party (PVV) of anti-Islam campaigner Geert Wilders, which came first in general elections last year. The other three parties agreed to join the government provided Wilders himself did not become premier.
The country’s new agriculture minister is Femke Wiersma, 39, a city dweller who achieved fame in 2010 in the Farmer Wants a Wife programme. She married the farmer, had four children, got divorced and became a politician for the populist Farmer Citizen Movement (BBB) which broke on to the national stage in 2019 heading agricultural protests against environmental laws.