An MP for the right-wing VVD party is standing down on September 1 to take up a new job, just five months after the general election.

Pieter Duisenberg, who is the party’s spokesman on education, is about to become chairman of the Dutch universities’ association VvU. He is the first of the 150 MPs to leave after the March 15 vote.

Duisenberg, who is also chairman of the parliamentary finance committee, was first elected to parliament in 2012.

Parliamentary chairwoman Khadija Arib has been highly critical of MPs leaving the job before their time is up. ‘As a chosen representative of the people, you should complete your term in office. You are given a mandate by voters,’ she said earlier. ‘But I cannot force them [to stay].’

Duisenberg told website Nu.nl the timing is unfortunate ‘but I think I can make a better contribution to improving our higher education this way.’