Centre Democrats (Netherlands)

Centre Democrats (Netherlands)

The Centre Democrats (Dutch: Centrumdemocraten / Centrum Democraten, CD) was a political party in the Netherlands. Founded in 1984 by members who split out from the Centre Party (CP), the Centre Democrats was joined one month later by the only CP Member of Parliament—Hans Janmaat. Janmaat went on to become the leader of the party, which subsequently became strongly centered around his person. The newly formed Centre Democrats represented the more moderate faction of the Centre Party, but espoused an anti-immigration and nationalist ideology. Their claims of standing in the centre of the political landscape have thus been disputed by political scientists.

The Centre Democrats did not gain enough votes for parliamentary representation in the 1986 general election, but Janmaat won back his seat after the following election in 1989. In 1994 he was joined by two additional representatives won by the party. The CD was subject to a cordon sanitaire by the other parties in Parliament, although some parties rather sought to confront it following its 1994 success. The CD failed to win any seats in the 1998 election, and it fell into disarray until it was finally dissolved in 2002.