Hannah Mae has been named Emmenaar of the Year. She received this award last night during the municipality’s New Year’s reception.
The 26-year-old singer, who grew up in Weerdinge, started writing her own songs about ten years ago. Her single Back to you from 2019 gained national fame because it was used in a supermarket advertisement.
Later, Hannah Mae switched to Dutch songs. She performed the song together with the Belgian Metejoor What do you want from me? out. She scored a number 1 hit in Belgium with I want you to liea duet with Maksim Stojanac. Her big breakthrough in the Netherlands followed this year thanks to her participation in the television program Dear Singers.
The Emmer Cultuurprijs was won this year by Harmonie Euterpe. The orchestra received the prize for the project Zoo Sounds. This allows anyone to learn to play an instrument, even if they have no experience. Moreover, it teaches participants to play together in a so-called start-up orchestra.
During the New Year’s reception, the mayor also traditionally gave a New Year’s speech. In it, Eric van Oosterhout lashed out at the attitude of politicians in The Hague in the refugee debate. “Refugees who have left home and hearth behind, fleeing wars, end up in a country where more and more people look away. In politics in The Hague, coldness and heartlessness apparently depend on a democratic majority and I must honestly admit that I am can’t get used to.”
Van Oosterhout also mentioned the, in his view, difficult contact with the cabinet and the financial concerns of many municipalities for the ‘ravine year’ 2026. “I have been working in local politics for about twenty years now, but the way things are going now, I still have never experienced. The polder, which was once inhabited by sympathetic government partners, is deserted.”
The mayor misses the conversation with The Hague. “We are missing the important The Hague frameworks on important topics such as social security, climate, agriculture, housing and asylum. There is also increasing uncertainty about what the government expects from municipalities, until recently ‘the first government’, which is closest to citizens.”