Matthijs van Nieuwkerk’s decision to break with BNNVARA saved this broadcaster a difficult decision: should they break with him? I was very curious about such a decision, especially because that broadcaster has kilos of butter on its battered head in the Van Nieuwkerk scandal. How would that butter be melted, gradually through a time-consuming investigation or with a quick cancellation of the contract?
“The fact that my employer openly doubts my sincerity makes further cooperation impossible,” Van Nieuwkerk explained. There is a certain amount of indignation in his words, something that was also noticeable in his first comment on the article in de Volkskrant. In that response, according to de Volkskrant, he expressed no regrets and did not respond to the fact that so many employees fell ill.
BNNVARA then announced that it was disappointed, after which Van Nieuwkerk came up with a new statement five minutes later in which he sounded more remorseful and did use the word regret. But he immediately counterattacked: “At the same time, this article is also a draconian caricature of fifteen years of DWDD.” He further noted that there were editors for whom the great challenge of the program was “in good hands” and there were those “for whom it was less so”; ‘and unfortunately I had little time for them’.
It is as if to suggest, “They were bruises, and I could use my time better.”
I can imagine that BNNVARA, after studying that first text, began to doubt Van Nieuwkerk’s sincerity. All the more so because in previous conversations with management he had acknowledged that he had crossed borders, says Suzanne Kunzeler, director of BNNVARA. Kunzeler, who has only been director of this broadcaster since May 2022, admits that the management should have intervened much earlier. “The fact that this did not happen at the time is painful for the former colleagues who are affected by this.”
One of those colleagues is Frans Klein, now NPO director, and until 2014 media director of VARA responsible for DWDD. He knew about the tensions surrounding Van Nieuwkerk, but did not do enough about it. It is wise that he temporarily stops his work at the NPO.
Van Nieuwkerk’s behavior is often explained with a reference to the great pressure under which he had to work. He himself also speaks of “perhaps madness”. I do not underestimate his work, but as an explanation of his behavior it does not seem to me sufficient. There have been TV programs of a similar high frequency before, in the Netherlands by the likes of Sonja Barend, Frits Barend, Henk van Dorp, Paul Witteman, Jeroen Pauw, and there is the British example of Jeremy Paxman who worked for the BBC for 25 years. News night and said at his farewell: “After 25 years I sometimes want to go to bed at the same time as most people.”
Such programs were not surrounded by scandals like now with DWDD. Van Nieuwkerk’s friends react with bewilderment, they have never noticed such unpleasant behavior. That suggests he treated them in a way he couldn’t muster some of his colleagues: as equals. He will have to consult himself about the cause of this.
A version of this article also appeared in the newspaper of November 23, 2022