European Union Tomaat Partij

General info
Founded: January 5th, 2021

Based: Brussels, Belgium

Active in: European Union, Kingdom of the Netherlands, and the united kingdom

Ideology: free tomatoes, big tent, tomato-industry

Leader: Gerard Krokodil

Seats (EP): 107 / 708

About
The EUTP was founded on the 5th of January 2021 by Gerard Krokodil, they quickly grew performing well in multiple elections. In their early days, they were founded on the principle idea's of communism, combined with predomenantly agriculturalism. Specificly on the subject of tomato-related economy. They wish to promote the healthyness and cultural importance of the tomato to the rest of Europe, advocating for the tomato farmers. Nowadays, they've rejected communism-ideology and have a more centrism stance on policies. However still very active on policies promoting tomatoes.

History
FOUNDATION

Gerard Krokodil, a Dutch politician who had succes in the formation of the big tent/pan-European political party Do It, decided to form a pro-tomato party. It had come to his knowledge that eating tomatoes was very heatlhy and although the European Tomato industry is succesfull, it is also threathened by countries like China. All the wile the industry is not well supported. He started the movement on January 5th 2021 and was slated to run for the first parliamentary elections of January 14th 2021. To everybody's surprise the EUTP managed tomake an instant impact and attracted enough votes to get them 53 seats. But there great victory was yet to come: in the 3rd Parliamentary elections they become the 2nd largest party.

THE C-14 AFFAIR

In the wake of this election, the EUTP's existence became threatened when EFA party leader Zakuween put in a motion in parliament to disban the party. Citing bill C-14 (a bill prohibiting the formation of satirical parties), Zakuween reasoned the agenda of the Tomato Party was only to promote tomato-related issues and therefore was largely satirical. Eventually the motion failed to pass parliament: 2-15-4. Saving the future of the Tomato Party. Directly after this affair, bill C-14 was repealed by the president.

Elections
In the first parliamentary election they managed to get 7.54% of the vote. It would get them 53 seats in the European Parliament and made them 6th party. In first round of the third presidential elections they achieved 9% of the vote placing them in 5th position. In the 2nd parliamentary election of January 24th 2021 they managed to solidify their position and got 8,09% of the vote (57 seats). In the 3rd Parliamentary elections of February 6th 2021 the EUTP became the second largest party in the European Parliament getting 17,9% of the total vote (126 seats). In the 4th Parliamentary elections of February 20th 2021 the EUTP, although losing seats, managed to become the biggest fraction in Parliament: with 107 seats they were one seat bigger then PES and Greens.