I am currently re-watching the Borgen series, in which Birgitte Nyborg, as Prime Minister of Denmark, practices politics as best she can during all kinds of cleverly scripted dilemmas. I watch it to better understand why politicians do what they do.
At the end of season two, everything goes to shit. Nyborg’s daughter Laura has severe anxiety attacks and finds herself in a private clinic, just as Nyborg wants to reform healthcare. One of the reform points: private care indirectly destroys regular care. As soon as the press gets wind of Laura’s private treatment place, photographers are in the bushes. Nyborg is in a dilemma. She may lose both her daughter and her plans for reform. Awkward timing for Nyborg, top entertainment for me.
Yesterday, when it became known that the Ministry of Health, Welfare and Sport is not releasing the WhatsApp traffic and other communications of Hugo de Jonge and VWS leaders around the mouth mask deal (except to Deloitte, which is now conducting an independent investigation) and feel free to pay the penalty of 15 thousand euros. I thought of scenes where Nyborg practices answering difficult questions.
Specifically, I was thinking of scenes when something politically awkward has leaked. Her spin doctor tries her best to find the best answers—many answers turn out to be dangerous. When Nyborg speaks to the press, everything is often so rehearsed that she sometimes says empty things. However, never in the series does Nyborg come to the kind of empty sentences that Hugo de Jonge came to when he spoke to RTL4 a few months ago about his role in the mouth cap deal. He repeated about five times in two and a half minutes: ‘I can’t respond to that, because research is being done at the moment (…) I think it would be nice to explain exactly how it works. The investigation will clarify the situation.’ Waiting for Godot is nothing.
Nyborg’s Private Business Gets In Secure a political charge. ‘We need a strategy,’ insists her spin doctor. They contact the national press, provide all the information about the case. On television, Nyborg still faces some headwinds, but this is countered by a strong interview with a psychologist from the clinic. The problem seems to have passed and the health care reform package is being adopted. But the photographers don’t disappear. Nyborg must find another place for Laura.
The next morning, Nyborg gives a press conference: ‘It is vital for my family to get through these problems and for the government to work in peace. So I beg you, the media, to respect that my daughter needs rest. But a prime minister cannot avoid the attention of the press. This story is one of common interest.’ Nyborg goes on leave until her daughter is better.
The personal is always political, paying the penalty payment (if I’ve paid attention to Secure) time to prepare answers. Although I wonder: compared to the personally very difficult situation of Nyborg, what exactly is at stake for Hugo de Jonge and the likes if whatsapp traffic and face mask deal communication will soon become public?