Wouter Bos is standing down as leader of the Labour party, leaving Amsterdam mayor Job Cohen as his apparent heir.

Bos told a surprise news conference on Friday morning he is to leave the party for personal reasons.
‘As the father of young children, I have other responsibilities,’ Bos said. Job Cohen would be the ‘best possible successor’, Bos said. ‘The PvdA would be in good hands with him.’
The two had first discussed Bos’s possible resignation in 2007, he told reporters.
‘It is a brave decision but a very big loss for the party and the country,’ said former home affairs minister Guusje ter Horst. ‘The scandal is all those men who do not see their children growing up.’
Cohen
Cohen announced at a news conference on Friday afternoon he is stepping down as the capital’s mayor with immediate effect and is ready to lead the party’s campaign into the June 9 general election.
He has been mayor of the capital since 2001. His duties will be taken over by deputy mayor Lodewijk Asscher pending the appointment of a new mayor.
Cohen still has to be formally elected campaign leader by the Labour party itself.
Brave
Former education minister Ronald Plasterk said Cohen would be a bonus for the Netherlands. ‘He is wise, has authority and a lot of experience,’ Plasterk said.
Geert Wilders, who said last week the general election would be a battle between himself and Bos, said the Labour leader was ‘throwing his towel in very quickly’.
‘The PvdA is going back to the 1990s by bringing back tea-drinking multiculti-cuddler Cohen,’ Wilders said.

Surprise
Nos tv political commentator Ferry Mingelen said the news of Bos’s resignation was ‘completely unexpected’.
‘If there is one person who can lead the Labour party at this time it is Cohen,’ he said, referring to Cohen’s reputaton for bridge-building.
Cohen was named one of Time magazine’s European heros in 2005 for the way he defused racial tensions following the murder of film maker Theo van Gogh.
In addition, Cohen ‘could also ease the way toward cooperation with the CDA’, Mingelen said. Commentators had said it would have been very difficult for Bos to work with the CDA after he pulled Labour out of the government.
Eurlings

Bos’s resignation follows the shock decision of Christian Democrat transport minister Camiel Eurlings to stand down in order to raise a family. Eurlings was seen by many as the next CDA leader.
And last week, Socialist Party leader Agnes Kant resigned following her party’s poor showing in the local elections.
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