Dutch left reeling by assassination

Pim Fortuyn's death could shake up the political system

By Tim Franks BBC Europe correspondent in The Hague

"It's very simple," the Dutch politician said.

"People in Holland don't get shot. It was our 11 September, it was an affront to democracy."

It is shocking, shocking, shocking

A man at the site of the killing

Among the crowd that gathered by the car park where Pim Fortuyn was shot, people stared at the ground and shook their heads.

One woman said: "I feel very sad, I'm very angry."

A man near her added: "It is shocking, shocking, shocking. It's unbelievable.

"This man, he is not [Austria's far-right leader Joerg] Haider, he is not [French National Front leader Jean-Marie] Le Pen, he is not extreme right.

"This man wants to say things that the people of this country long think."

Message to foreigners

Fortuyn's mesage for those people was that the Netherlands is full - no more immigration.

Wim Kok was visibly shaken by his rival's shooting

And for foreigners already in the Netherlands - assimilate, become like us.

Pim Fortuyn was openly gay and socially liberal and in his eyes, Islam, for example, was backward.

His followers were left casting round for explanations.

One man concluded: "The prime minister I blame."

But his fellow rejected the supposition. "That's disrespect," he said.

When the view was repeated: "I think we are all to be blamed and the prime minister is the first to be blamed," his opponent was not to be swayed. "You cannot blame the entire society for just one man," he said.

Yet the first man stuck to his argument.

I am broken, I am really broken about what happened today in our country

Dutch Prime Minister Wim Kok

"It is that we have allowed too much in this country - if it is foreigners, if it is drugs, if it is lack of security."

For a time on Monday night, it was Pim Fortuyn's own supporters who were causing the mayhem - in The Hague they threw missiles at the police.

Inside the parliament, the prime minister, so long the target of Mr Fortuyn's barbs, was clearly affected by the killing.

A socialist colleague told me he had never seen Wim Kok so shaken and emotional.

One positive legacy

The prime minister said: "Words are not enough.

"I am broken, I am really broken about what happened today in our country."

One positive legacy even Mr Fortuyn's opponents agree he bequeathed is the shake-up of the comatose political establishment.

But there are pressing questions left - what is to become of his party, the Lijst Pim Fortuyn?

Further ahead, what damage will have been wrought to the Dutch national psyche and for all of Europe's political mainstream, what to say about immigration and how to end disenchantment with the establishment?