The approach to football violence in the Netherlands appears to be improving, but at the same time there is still much room for improvement. Various experts indicated this on Wednesday during a round table discussion with members of the House of Representatives.
According to national portfolio holder for football at the Public Prosecution Service, René de Beukelaer, things are going “quite well” in curbing stadium violence in the Netherlands. “It is especially important to stay on course with what we do, we see the effect, we see well-intentioned supporters stand up more, and we get rid of quite a few malicious people.”
However, as far as he is concerned, there are important discussions that need to be had about, among other things, the criminalization of chants, the digital reporting obligation and the exclusion of away fans.
Director of professional football KNVB Marianne van Leeuwen also sees a decrease in the number of incidents, “but we are not there yet and we need politics.” She therefore makes an “urgent appeal to the House of Representatives to cooperate on further measures.”
Van Leeuwen suggests measures such as special football investigation teams for the police, criminal stadium bans and the legal option to deploy stewards in multiple stadiums.
Prevention
If it were up to speakers such as Professor of Sociology Ramón Spaaij, Mayor of Breda Paul Depla and Chairman of the Supporters Collective Matthijs Keuning, more focus would be placed on prevention and not just on repression. According to them, the starting point should be that the entire group does not have to pay for the misconduct of a small group.
“0.02 percent of the supporters received a stadium ban last season,” and we must realize that, according to Keuning. He therefore calls on the House to “see supporters as an ally and not as an enemy.” Something that, according to Keuning, does happen in the current policy.
Chairman of the Dutch Sports Council, Michael van Praag, as a former chairman of Ajax, swears by regular contact with the hard core by directors and chairmen of football clubs themselves. He said he did this successfully for thirteen years, “more would have happened if I had not maintained contact.” According to Van Praag, this gives you, as chairman or director, the favor factor that causes the supporters of the hard core to refrain from violent behavior.