The Dutch dubbed him “Teflon Mark” because scandals always slid off him like pancakes from a non-stick pan.
But Mark Rutte, the Netherlands’ longest-serving leader and current second-longest-serving EU leader, has now come unstuck.
The 56-year-old leader of the centre-right VVD party stunned parliament on Monday by announcing that he would leave politics after elections, following the collapse of his coalition government in a row over migration.
The stalwart of European politics had survived a previous resignation and multiple re-elections due to his backroom skills and his “Mr Normal” image.
Rutte made a characteristically low-key arrival to tender his resignation to the Dutch king on Saturday, driving himself in his humble Saab station wagon.
One slight surprise on that occasion was that he did not arrive on his bike, as he had done for previous meetings with King Willem-Alexander.
But the big surprise was that this skilled political operator had fallen by a crisis of his own making, with elections not due for another couple of years.
Rutte’s demands for a limit on family reunifications for asylum seekers always looked like it would be too much for his coalition partners.
Dutch media said he had been playing to hardliners in his own party who wanted a tougher stance on migration.
– Bikes and apples –
Ironically given the current chaos, Rutte has long traded on an image of stability and caution in the face of southern European debt, populism and the Covid pandemic.
He rides his bike around The Hague, sometimes munching an apple with one hand and the other on the handlebars as he cycles to meetings with foreign leaders.
Tall and bespectacled, he has described himself as a “man of habit and tradition” who has lived in The Hague all his life and volunteers as a part-time teacher.
The youngest of seven children, his father Izaak was a trader, while his mother Mieke was the sister of Izaak’s first wife, who died in a Japanese internment camp in World War II.
Rutte initially wanted to be a concert pianist, but after attending the prestigious Leiden University he joined the Anglo-Dutch consumer giant Unilever, where he spent a stint at its peanut butter division, Calve.
A fan of British leaders Winston Churchill and Margaret Thatcher, Rutte finally went into politics with the pro-business VVD (People’s Party for Freedom and Democracy).
Rutte became premier in 2010 and immediately showed what critics called a willingness to sacrifice principle for power, entering a coalition supported by the firebrand anti-Islam politician Geert Wilders that later collapsed.
Wilders failed to unseat Rutte despite several attempts.
– ‘Best job in world’ –
But critics said Rutte only managed to do so by pandering to the same anti-immigration rhetoric, with the issue now casting its shadow over his party once again.
“We call him the ‘Teflon’ prime minister,” Jesse Klaver, leader of the GroenLinks (Green-Left) party, told AFP at the time.
Rutte finally seemed to come unstuck in 2021, when his coalition resigned over a scandal in which thousands of parents, many from ethnic minority backgrounds, were falsely accused of childcare subsidy fraud.
But he then stayed on as caretaker premier, and won elections two months later.
In Europe furious southern countries have branded him “Mr No” for his opposition to bailouts, and he has rowed with Hungary’s Viktor Orban, the only EU leader to have been in office longer than him.
But he has found common cause with Germany and France on many issues, and has been a strong supporter of Ukraine as it battles the Russian invasion.
More recently he was mentioned as a possible future successor as NATO chief or European Council head.
Rutte though had repeatedly said he was happy where he was.
“It’s the best job in the world,” Rutte told a press conference in 2022 when he passed former PM Ruud Lubbers’ record for time in office — before joking: “I feel like I’m nearly halfway through.”
