A candidate for the European parliamentary elections on behalf of the anti-immigration PVV used to campaign against its leader Geert Wilders, the Volkskrant reports on Friday.

Olaf Stuger, who is number three on the list and therefore has a very high chance of election, campaigned against Wilders in the past, saying he ‘is driving society further apart’.

Stuger was previously a member of the Liberal democratic party D66 and was elected an MP for Pim Fortuyn’s LPF after the populist’s murder in 2002. In 2006, he took part in a demonstration defending Fortuyn’s heritage against the ‘radical right’, including PVV leader Wilders.

Stuger told the Volkskrant that this all happened eight years ago. ‘If you want to make a point, you have to be controversial,’ he said.

Former PVV

Meanwhile, Laurence Stassen, who used to lead the PVV’s European delegation but quit following Geert Wilders’ anti-Moroccan comments, is now running in England.

Stassen is the lead candidate for the minor English eurosceptic party An Independence from Europe in the South East region.

The European elections take place in England and the Netherlands on May 22 and on May 25 in most other countries.