Janke Dekker, the wife of Tom Egbers, takes on the role of victim enormously. However, critics do not think this is justified. “She definitely knew what was going on with her husband!”
There was no other way out: Janke Dekker resigned yesterday as chairman of Mores, the hotline for reporting undesirable behavior in the media. Her position had actually been controversial for a long time due to the fact that investigations have been underway for months into misconduct at NOS Sport, where her husband Tom Egbers works.
Janke for shame
Now that Tom has been exposed by de Volkskrant as a NOS bully, it turns out that several people did not report to Mores because his wife held sway there. Janke has been saying for months that she has absolutely no access to reports that are made and that she would leave immediately if one came in about Tom.
That has now happened, after the Volkskrant publication, but with pain and effort. Where Janke in her position as Mores forewoman was expected to step into the breach for victims, she now mainly stands in for Tom. She accuses de Volkskrant of having delivered more or less shoddy work. Weak, Humberto Tan thinks that reaction.
Health
Even after her resignation, Janke does not change her mind, but she shows Linda de Mol-like traits. She has a very aggrieved one press statement out the door in which she comes up with a series of alternative facts. ‘Facts’ provided by de Volkskrant with the greatest of ease debunked become.
Janke really gets into the victim role. For example, she also points out that she and Tom are under “mental and physical” pressure. “Partly in view of the fact that my husband’s health is not doing well due to this incorrect reporting and in particular the consequences thereof, I will keep this statement brief.”
No compassion
Rob Goossens shows in RTL Boulevard little pity though. “She discredited the hotline, she put her colleagues in front of the block, so she just had to leave. I hope her colleagues also understand that they cannot say: ‘She was such a nice and sweet woman.’ No, she made a big mistake.”
It’s outrageous that she didn’t leave sooner, says Rob. He points out that Janke had known about Tom’s affair with an intern for years and years. In addition, RTL Boulevard now reveals that they received information in December about inappropriate messages that Tom would have sent to a colleague. Janke has also been approached about this.
Jack shaken
Tom brushed aside the allegations on December 17 in an app message to RTL Boulevard (see photo above); he could not be reached by telephone. Janke did give a telephone response to the show section on the same day. “Janke did answer the phone then and he was emotional,” reveals reporter Aran Bade.
He continues: “She was shocked by this message we gave her. She said, “I don’t know about this,” and then there was another long silence. Some kind of emotional response from her.”
Get on
Janke has promised for months to leave Mores immediately if signals about her husband came in, but according to RTL Boulevard there have been several moments that led to this. That makes her long stay in office questionable: what was Janke’s intention in stubbornly continuing to hold her chairmanship?
Aran: “She should have made that decision right then.” And Rob: “She could have known that her husband would appear in it (the Volkskrant article, ed.) And yet she has let it arrive until now.”
Bridget Maasland also thinks: “She should have known that this could not continue with Mores.”
‘she knew about it’
Private boss Evert Santegoeds finds Janke’s attitude strange. He says in Show news: “Janke has indeed often known that all kinds of things were going on with her husband and nevertheless became the initiator of a hotline where precisely this kind of misconduct in the media and the art world should be denounced. Now she’s angry.”
Colleague Ronald Molendijk: “I don’t think you can send a letter with all due respect to this woman in which everything is downplayed. Then I think: I simply have a high opinion of de Volkskrant in that regard.”
And Maarten van Rossem summarizes in his podcast: “That is certainly not good at all, of course.”
Janke also receives strong criticism on Twitter: