If the Noordoostpolder municipal council does not agree to the establishment of an application center for asylum seekers, the government is prepared to use coercion. That is what several officials involved say to NRC†
On Wednesday morning it was announced that the government wants to open a second application center in the village of Bant, a few tens of meters next to the asylum seekers’ center in Luttelgeest, where a thousand people are being received. For the application center, where asylum seekers arriving in the Netherlands must report, “two hundred and fifty to three hundred reception places” will be realised, State Secretary Eric van der Burg (Asylum, VVD) writes to the House of Representatives. For example, the application center in Ter Apel, which has been overcrowded for months, must be relieved.
The Noordoostpolder city council also heard about the plans for the first time on Wednesday morning. Councilors felt ambushed. They were updated on Wednesday evening, including by Milo Schoenmaker, head of the Central Agency for the Reception of Asylum Seekers (COA).
In the villages (Luttelgeest has 2,700 inhabitants, Bant 1,300) there is “no enthusiasm” for more asylum seekers, says party chairman Berthoo Lammers of council faction Ons Noordoostpolder on the phone. Alex Tuinenga, of the Political Union – one of the two largest political groups in the Noordoostpolder – calls it a “difficult issue”.
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But even if the city council is against it, the government wants to continue construction. The cabinet writes that it considers the reception of asylum seekers to be of national importance. It is not known what resources the government intends to use for this. In March, State Secretary Van der Burg said that to exert force for the reception of asylum seekers would be “a defeat”.
It is unknown when the second application center should open. It has yet to be built, on a piece of land where barns and stables now stand. The purchased land has an agricultural purpose. Facilities for a center housing hundreds of people have yet to be built. The COA initially wants to install movable “cabins” made of plastic on the site, a spokesperson said.
Nitrogen rights
The owner of the farmland himself offered his land to the province of Flevoland. The province mediated in the sale. The COA bought the land last Friday. Both COA and the province of Flevoland have bought the nitrogen rights from the farmer. The province can now use those rights for other farmers who do not yet meet the nitrogen standards.
Farmer Chris Woldberg, who sold the land, says he was unaware the plot would be used for asylum seekers. He thought he was selling the land to the province of Flevoland and says that he had “nothing to do with COA or anything like that”.
I had nothing to do with COA or anything
Chris Woldberg seller of land
At the moment, all asylum seekers who come to the Netherlands must report to Ter Apel in Groningen. There they are registered and identified, and distributed to asylum seekers centers across the country. But because all centers are full, the application center is overcrowded. Almost every night all beds are occupied and asylum seekers have to sleep on chairs. To relieve the pressure on the center, asylum seekers are driven at night by buses to temporary night shelter locations throughout the Netherlands. Last Tuesday night, thirty asylum seekers decided to sleep in front of the gate, for fear that they would otherwise miss their appointment in Ter Apel.
An extra registration center has been discussed for years. At the end of 2021, the then State Secretary Ankie Broekers-Knol (Justice and Security, VVD) promised that the location of a new application center would be known in January this year. That didn’t happen; municipalities refused to cooperate because they feared becoming ‘a second Ter Apel’. Van der Burg announced in the spring that he wants to open three new application centers.
The spokespersons for State Secretary Van der Burg could not be reached for comment.
A version of this article also appeared in the newspaper of 7 July 2022