Former mayor and former minister Bram Peper (82) passed away | Instagram

Pepper is 82 years old. He lived in Rotterdam and died on Saturday afternoon after a short illness in the presence of his loved ones. PvdA member Peper was mayor of Rotterdam from 1982 to 1998. He then became Minister of the Interior in the second Kok cabinet.

Peper was born in 1940 as the son of a metal worker. His father was a communist. Peper attended the HBS-B and was a semi-professional footballer from the age of seventeen to twenty-third. He was selected several times for the Dutch amateur team. He studied social sciences at the University of Amsterdam. After his studies he worked as a professor of sociology at the Erasmus University in Rotterdam, and he was also an advisor to the then mayor of that city, André van der Louw.

In 1982, at the age of 42, Peper followed in Van der Louw’s footsteps and was installed as mayor of his favorite city. At his retirement in 1998, Peper was awarded the Van Oldenbarnevelt Medal; this is the highest municipal award of the city of Rotterdam. Peper returned the medal in 2001. In October 2003, Peper announced that he wanted to return as elected mayor in Rotterdam in 2006. Since the proposal to work with elected mayors from now on was rejected, nothing came of this plan.

From 3 August 1998 Peper was Minister of the Interior of the Kok II cabinet. From September 1999, however, various reports appeared in the media about Peper’s declarations from his mayoral term that were allegedly incorrect, a secret mayor’s commercial from which incorrect payments had been made, private use of the ship the Nieuwe Maze, and clumsy behavior towards staff. It became clear that Peper had made few friends at the city hall in Rotterdam in his last years as mayor.

On March 13, 2000, Peper resigned as minister, in his own words in order not to burden public administration and to better defend himself against the allegations. On March 15, 2000, Peper made his declarations public via the internet. The report of the Rotterdam Commission for the Investigation of the Account will be published on March 17, which states that Peper has not declared correctly. This report sparked a two-year legal battle that was ultimately settled in Peper’s favour.

According to the mayor of Rotterdam Ahmed Aboutaleb, Peper was a great administrator and thinker in his time. His views on social renewal and the development of the Kop van Zuid, including the construction of the Erasmus Bridge, were progressive and have contributed enormously to the current quality of the city. Unfortunately, he has also suffered from poor health in recent years. And yet he regularly appeared at all kinds of urban activities to show his interest.” Aboutaleb and the rest of the Rotterdam city council say they experience the death as a “heavy loss for the city”.

The PvdA mourns the death of former mayor and minister Bram Peper, who was politically active for the social democratic party for many years. “We are going to miss his sharp eye and enormous involvement,” the PvdA reported on Twitter. “Our thoughts go out to his relatives.”

Party leader Attje Kuiken speaks of a ‘very sad message.’ Peper ‘was the foundation of Rotterdam as we know it today and will be missed by us and many Rotterdammers and Dutch’, she writes. “My thoughts are with his family and friends.”

Party chairman Esther-Mirjam Sent also reflects on Peper’s death on Saturday evening. “On my last visit to him, his door was wide open. He spoke with concern about the breakdown of the government and argued for a strong state.’ Sent calls the former mayor ‘observant, smart and involved. We’re going to miss you, Bram.’