There are those moments when you as a driver have to swallow hard, says Nijmegen mayor Hubert Bruls (CDA). For example, if an entrepreneur shows you on the talk show On 1 during a discussion about the fireworks ban, casually describes it as “that big ball of mincemeat”.
While he’s talking about it on the phone, Bruls gets upset about it again. “It is very serious when an authority figure is put away like this, but nobody at the table says anything about it. Diederik Gommers is just laughing along!”
Bruls is used to a lot. His mailbox receives messages every day from angry citizens who often address the chairman of the Security Council (the 25 presidents of the security regions) personally. “That is sometimes very rude, don’t make any illusions.”
But Bruls also knows that he has to let the insults slip away. The tone around corona in the Netherlands is already so heated. “You are murderers too,” protesters shouted during a demonstration in Amsterdam on Saturday, following a (false) rumor that one of the rioters who had been shot in Rotterdam on Friday had meanwhile died.
Drivers in the Netherlands try to keep a cool head. With regularly recurring corona demonstrations, football supporters who are not allowed to go to the stadium for the time being and decreasing support for corona policy, the situation is already difficult enough. Not only in the healthcare sector, but also in the police and emergency services, the stretch has more or less disappeared after more than a year and a half after the start of the epidemic. “We will remain extra alert in the coming weeks,” says the mayor of Groningen, Koen Schuiling (VVD). “But I happily say: as long as it is possible.”
Also read: For the second time: no deaths by police bullets
Dilemma
Mayors are faced with a dilemma when it comes to maintaining peace in their city. On the one hand, they want to act hard. “The government should never give way to violence or the threat of violence,” says Paul Depla (PvdA), mayor of Breda. On the other hand, they want to prevent peaceful protesters against the corona policy from radicalizing because they feel they are being cornered. Depla: “You have to be careful that the group that uses violence does not grow, so you have to keep in touch with the people who want to peacefully criticize the corona policy.”
At first glance, the fierce riots in Rotterdam seemed to be the work of a broad coalition: antivaxxers, the hard core of football club Feyenoord, underprivileged young people from Rotterdam-West. But mayors keep the different groups jealously apart. Bruls says that he does not want to be ‘taken hostage’ by hooligans and ‘radikalinskis’ who are out for a confrontation. “We are talking about no more than a few thousand people out of 17.5 million Dutch people.”
Making here in the Netherlands
Not everything went wrong this weekend. “Alarm bells” went off in Paul Depla’s head on Friday when he heard what had happened in Rotterdam: a large demonstration was planned in Breda on Saturday. “You immediately scale up in the preparation, with people who are active in the neighbourhoods.” In the end, the atmosphere remained friendly and festive.
Groningen was less lucky. On Sunday, between five hundred to a thousand people demonstrated against the corona measures. Without escalation, without vandalism and with – according to Schuiling – “many adults” in the procession. Then things went wrong, when young people were called on via social media to gather in front of the Groningen train station with fireworks. A little later, a group of fifty to seventy young people went to the Grote Markt. “We have tried to talk to them,” Schuiling says. “When shop windows were broken, the riot police took action.”
Do not think that the rioting young people in the market were motivated by the discussion about the possible introduction of 2G, Schuiling says: “What you see here is that a small group of young people use corona to legitimize themselves and shout things like ‘we want our freedom back.”
bubbling
It is bubbling in the underbelly of the Netherlands, says Member of Parliament Attje Kuiken (PvdA). She absolutely does not want to condone the riots. But due to the corona epidemic, existing problems are magnified: the lack of opportunities, low wages and flex contracts, the problems in the housing market. According to Kuiken, the sometimes faltering corona policy contributes to the dissatisfaction: “Distrust in society thrives on the broken promises of this cabinet.”
The mayor of Groningen Schuiling also does not think the corona policy is clear enough. Take the fireworks ban of New Year’s Eve, which will come into effect after negative reports. “In the Netherlands, we turn everything into a bargaining party,” says Schuiling. While in a crisis you mainly need clear rules.” Paul Depla agrees. “If it looks too much like compromise work, support for measures quickly diminishes.”
PvdA spokesperson Attje Kuiken warns against raising false expectations. While the cabinet philosophized about keeping society largely open with the help of 2G, it hinted that a more severe lockdown was inevitable as far as it was concerned. “We’re not here to be popular,” says Kuiken.
Mayor Bruls also calls for a clear message. But directors are sometimes also allowed to say something about the doubts they have and the dilemmas they face. The mayor recently received a long e-mail in which a resident of Nijmegen politely explained why he was against vaccination. Bruls will visit him soon.
#mayor #cool #riots
source https://pledgetimes.com/as-mayor-how-do-you-keep-a-cool-head-during-riots/
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