Femke Halsema has announced her intention to step down as leader of Green Left. In the Dutch daily AD, she says that the present term of office is her last and that the party knows they will have to find a successor.
Ms Halsema, who has led the Green Left party since Paul Rosenmoller’s resignation in 2002, says she has no idea what she will do when her political career comes to an end. “I’ll no doubt first have to fall into a kind of void for a couple of months before I can even think about it.”
Originally a member of the Labour Party, Ms Halsema joined the Green Left after what she considered police repression of protests during a European summit in Amsterdam in 1997. She sees herself as “free-thinking” (Dutch vrijzinnig), regarding the fight against poverty and the reduction of the state’s involvement in the individual’s privacy as crucial to real “freedom”.
An advocate of more cooperation between the left wing parties in the Netherlands, Green Left is currently engaged in dialogue with the Labour Party and the democrat party D66.
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I was never a groenlinks supporter but I do like this politician as a person and for her courage as a woman to stand up for womens rights, gay rights and freedom of expression even if she doesn´t agree with PVV, she always respected Wilders rigtht to free speech and for that, I admire the woman.