For the first time in history, a person born in the Netherlands has a good chance of winning a seat in the Bundestag, Germany's parliament. Dairy farmer Kees de Vries, originally from West Friesland, is high on the Christian Democratic Union’s (CDU) candidate list.
 
The farm that Kees de Vries and his wife bought 18 years ago in Deetz, a village around 100 kilometres west of Berlin, is no picture postcard farm; the house looks more like cement barracks than a fairy tale farmyard with roses around the door. It's hardly surprising, as the building currently used by the De Vrieses and their six children was not designed to be lived in, it was the recreation and break room for workers on an East German collective farm, a Landwirtschaftliche Produktionsgenossenschaft or LPG.

Like much of the East German economy, many LPGs went bankrupt when the DDR collapsed. For these ends 36-year-old Dutch farmer, it was a chance to escape from an uncertain future in the Netherlands: "my parents had an eight acre farm with 30 cows. Four of the 12 children wanted to be farmers and in the Netherlands that was just simply not possible. When the wall came down (in 1989), we seized our chance".

Dairy farm
In 18 years, the De Vries farm has grown into a substantial business with 700 milking cows, 600 calves and 1300 hectares of land. Several brothers, sisters and in-laws followed him to the former East Germany and now either work for Kees or have set themselves up as sheep farmers or artisans.

Even though his office still smells of the hundreds of cows that are stabled are just a dozen meters away, the room is really a political centre. The filing cabinets are crammed with documents from a number of local associations and the walls are covered with maps of East German election districts. Mr de Vries joined the local CDU 10 years ago and what began as a hobby has grown into a full-time job. It is impossible to be elected to high political office in Germany unless one is a citizen and so four years ago, Kees decided to become a German citizen, "it was very emotional, I didn't like it much".

Unique
A politician friend suggested running for the Bundestag in 2005 but de Vries didn't have the backing of his party. However, this time around, he is virtually assured of being elected to parliament on Sunday. And that will be an historic first: never before has a born-and-bred Dutch person been elected to the Bundestag. Mr De Vries comments, "yes, it does sound impressive but it's true, I am the first and it is unique".

Mr De Vries presents himself as a local man who knows and identifies with the concerns of people who live in the area. He denies that his Dutch roots are a problem: "I've been living here for almost 18 years, our children call it home, I employee 15 people. Do you really think that someone knows this area's problems better than me?" Possible criticism of his (perfect) German is waived away with a smile and he quotes his campaign slogan: "Kees de Vries speaks our language."

Advantage
An old bus pulls into the farmyard and delivers its passengers: 20 elderly locals. The farmer-politician invited them to come and meet him - he'd far rather that the voters come to him than vice-versa: "this farm is my ace-in-the-hole, it proves that I'm a local man with the same concerns and worries as other local people. The other candidates don't have anything like this, and I exploit it to the hilt".

The visitors, most of them women, look around the farm with amazement. Many of them worked on LPGs during the DDR years. One of them wonders aloud how Mr De Vries can run the business with just 15 employees. During the DDR period, more than 100 people worked on this farm.

Holländer
Erika Förster is a retired accountant and says she will certainly vote for Kees de Vries: he's an ordinary, local man and he has the same concerns as ours. It's not a problem that he's a Holländer, it is far more important that his breathing new life into farming in this region".

The German general election is scheduled for Sunday 27 September. The first results are expected at around 18 hours UTC.