The Dutch party that was led by Mr Pim Fortuyn has vowed to rally its election forces despite the assassination of its leader.
"Lijst Pim Fortuyn", only months old, could gain a wave of sympathy votes after the killing of its unorthodox and controversial leader, analysts said. But its long-term future may be in doubt without his media-savvy leadership.
Mr Fortuyn's party - including a former Miss Netherlands beauty queen, a Surninamese television presenter and businesswoman of Moroccan extraction - condemned mainstream rivals and the media for what it said had been a Fortuyn witch-hunt.
The "non-ideological, issue-based" party rounded on its critics for comparing the shaven-headed gay maverick with the former leader of Austria's far-right Freedom Party, Joerg Haider and France's Jean-Marie Le Pen.
Opinion polls suggested Fortuyn's party, set up just months ago, was on course to win about 15 per cent of the vote on May 15th, putting it on course to form a centre-right coalition with the main opposition Christian Democrats and VVD liberals.
Mr Fortuyn's rise on an anti-immigration platform has raised the political temperature in a country with a significant Afro-Caribbean, Turkish and Moroccan minority. About 10 per cent of the Dutch population are of non-Western origin.
He shocked the liberal political establishment by winning the balance of power in the Netherlands' second city, Rotterdam, earlier this year.