Esther Ouwehand put pressure on an employee who handles reports against her

Also read: The other side of Esther Ouwehand

Last week, the new board informed the integrity secretary that all reports must be transferred to them. According to sources, the new board has also advised the integrity secretary to report sick, because she herself said that she felt overloaded. According to those involved, it is not about overload, but it is made impossible for her to work.

The new board cannot respond to questions about this from NRC, says a party spokesperson. The reason stated is that the new board is busy with an inventory and investigation into reports.

After the whistleblower’s emails in August, the integrity secretary invited Ouwehand’s political assistant and also Ouwehand himself, as a manager, for an interview. Ouwehand then indicated that she saw no problem with the content of these emails. She speaks of a “brainstorming session” about her long-standing conflict with the board.

In the week before the conference, the integrity secretary received an email from Ouwehand in which the party leader complained about her approach.

“I am very surprised that a confidential 1-on-1 email from me to an integrity secretary ended up in the media,” Ouwehand responds in writing. “Outside of this bizarre situation, I can and would like to say the following about this: yes, I sent an email to the integrity secretary on September 19 in which I indicate which procedural errors, inaccuracies as well as serious carelessness the integrity secretary has made with regard to the report against my colleague.”

Ouwehand speaks of a “Kafkaesque and careless working method of the previous administration.” She emphasizes that she still does not know which integrity reports have been made against herself.

According to the resigned board, which does not wish to comment further, this is patently untrue.

Lawyer

Ouwehand’s lawyer addressed the new board in a letter, demanding that the reports be handled before the congress on September 24. At that conference, the members would vote on the list of candidates with Ouwehand as party leader. The integrity secretary had to call in legal assistance and did not respond to this demand from Ouwehand’s lawyer.

At the conference, party leader Ouwehand then announced that she would withdraw for the time being until there is clarity about the reports. She then called it on stage “the purest route”.

In response to a question from NRC about this letter from the lawyer, Ouwehand writes: “For me, but also for the members of the Party for the Animals, it was essential that there was clarification about the reports before the party congress of September 24. The old administration has refused to provide that clarification before the congress. (…) . As a result, I felt forced to temporarily step down to give the new board the space to carefully review the reports.”

At the conference, Ouwehand said she is confident that she can return “in the very short term.” The new chairman of the board, Michiel Knol, also said that the board would do everything it could to finalize the issue of reports “as quickly as possible”. On Monday, October 9, parties must submit their list of candidates for the elections to the Electoral Council.

New notifications

The new reports about Ouwehand, three of which are in the possession of NRC, come from employees and former employees. In one of them, a reporter talks about “bothering, manipulating, ignoring, creating unsafe situations” by Ouwehand. The former employee also addresses the new board and asks whether the “confidentiality clause” in the employment contract can be annulled so that employees and former employees can freely tell their stories. The author of the email asks for an independent, external investigation.

In another email, a reporter describes that Ouwehand has difficulty accepting contradictions and errors. It is generally known within the faction that the work is never good enough in her eyes. Employees who she believes are not loyal or not good enough can be ignored or have to leave. How to get employees or party members away would be prepared very precisely.

It hurts me a lot that people portray me as if I have no regard for the people around me

Yet another reporter calls Ouwehand’s behavior “toxic”. This employee was “under constant stress” and was “excluded from discussions and projects.” A personal story is how Ouwehand instructed this reporter to return to work, because the employee had spent ten days at the deathbed of a loved one. According to Ouwehand, it had “taken a very long time,” the report states. In retrospect, this employee would have liked to have reported it earlier. The report about Ouwehand is, the email states, mainly intended to help “the people in the faction that she is now excluding.”

Ouwehand said in a response: “It hurts me a lot that an image is portrayed of me as if I had no regard for the people around me. Under my leadership, we at the group offer all support, compassion and space to employees who are dealing with difficult personal circumstances, and that also applies to me.”

Failure due to power struggle

The power struggle in the Party for the Animals leads to breakdowns in the party’s organization. At the party office, director Lieke Keller, co-founder of the party, and one of the two official secretaries reported sick due to the situation. Member of Parliament Niko Koffeman has called in sick as an advisor to the House of Representatives faction. At least one faction employee was recently dismissed from her position. According to one person involved, “more people are about to collapse.”

Another employee who had reported sick was asked by Member of Parliament Christine Teunissen whether the data traffic via this employee’s computer could be investigated. This would be part of an internal investigation into who gave the emails of Ouwehand’s political assistant to the board in August. This employee withdrew a personal report about Esther Ouwehand out of fear, sources say.

“Emails were stolen and distributed without permission from the mailbox of a party leader in the House of Representatives. Naturally, an investigation has been started,” Christine Teunissen responded in writing through a spokesperson. “The fact that we also had to ask employees for their cooperation (in the form of permission for technical IT research) was a complicated issue for us, especially because one of the employees had reported sick. That is why we sought advice from an employment lawyer about this. The advice was that given the seriousness of the matter, it was a request we could make.”

Last month, MP Leonie Vestering resigned from her position, after a long-running conflict between Esther Ouwehand and her. Member of Parliament Eva van Esch, who continued to support Ouwehand, also announced that she would not return after the elections. Just before the list came out, she felt that she was “not the right person”, she tweeted on X.