Minister Marjolein Faber is mainly mocked for her appearance. The hair, the blouse buttoned to the highest point, the suit, the way she walks. It’s counterproductive. It creates a smokescreen around a failing minister. Moreover, it doesn’t bother her herself, it increases her cult status within her own circle. She has programmed herself to perform her task, the hairstyle is secondary.
Spokespeople report sick or disappear, new ones cannot be found. She cannot lead, she tolerates no contradiction: civil servants do not listen or go to work reluctantly. She does Asylum & Migration all by herself, every now and then she gets a thumbs up from Geert Wilders.
“Fantastic!” he tweeted coldly back from Israel, where he had been received and escorted as the head of state, after it had decided on its own to freeze all Syrian asylum applications. The hassle abroad is never terrible enough for her to come here. Anyone who takes to the streets here to celebrate the ouster of Assad might as well go back. Then it is safe enough there, she always thought Syria was a safe country.
The only people with whom Marjolein Faber still maintains warm ties are the troops of the military police. Thanks to her, they can finally do what they once joined the military police for. Wherever possible, she joins the flying brigades, chasing suspicious cars in the border areas. Everything for the deterrent effect.
Around her installation as minister, Omroep Gelderland made a profile of the politician Marjolein Faber, who had left an indelible impression in the Provincial House in Arnhem. This did not give the image of an inhuman, no one talked about her appearance. She was also described by political enemies such as Niko Koffeman of the Party for the Animals as, among other things, “a warm-hearted person”, but then “a warm-hearted person” who does not want to give way. It was as if, in a strange way, they were starting to miss her a little. Precisely because she makes it so easy for everyone to hate her, they had taken her to their hearts a bit. Someone said it would probably be a good idea to have her there for a birthday. Once she started working, she changed. Then she passes through armored glass for her ideals, which we can best summarize as a Netherlands free of foreign taints.
It is precisely by turning her into a ‘ma Flodder’ that gives her wind in her sails.
It doesn’t matter to her supporters that she doesn’t get anything done. After all, that is not her fault, but everyone else’s fault she-devil to make. Marjolein Faber is above all a bad politician with a twisted worldview. That should be enough to fight her in a mature democracy.
Marcel van Roosmalen writes a column on Mondays and Thursdays.