Sam Pormes, leader of GroenLinks in the Drenthe Parliament, remained silent about a conviction in 2017. His party is considering steps. And that’s not the first time. At the beginning of this century, Pormes and the party regularly ran into problems because Pormes was vague about his controversial past.
GroenLinks politician Sam Pormes (69) is once again in trouble because he withheld something from the party committee that opened the door to the Drenthe Parliament for him. Such committees screen candidates (in all parties) and are very keen on matters that can cause hassle at any given time. Integrity issues must therefore always be reported. A party does not want to be forced to say goodbye to an elected representative because of a corpse in the closet, also because you always have to wait and see whether that elected representative actually gives up his or her seat.
GroenLinks is now considering steps against the leader of GroenLinks in the Provincial Council of Drenthe because he concealed that in 2017 he was sentenced to repay more than 13,000 euros in unjustly received PGB funds.
Guerilla training in South Yemen
It fits a pattern: Pormes and GroenLinks regularly got into trouble because Pormes was not open about his past. In 2005, the GroenLinks party board decided to do so Extensive research to him, because since his entry into politics stories have been circulating about his participation in a 1976 guerrilla training in South Yemen about his involvement in the train hijacking he De Punt in 1977, about the 1982 shooting of a police car in Assen and about malpractice at the foundation Masiun en unduly received benefits . The researchers conclude that it is very likely that Pormes was involved to a greater or lesser extent in these four events.
At least seven incidents
In addition, the committee concluded that during his political career, Sam Pormes did not or did not fully disclose matters to GroenLinks with regard to the conduct under investigation. Pormes was systematically not open about his past to various integrity and selection committees of the party. There are at least seven incidents.
In 1990 he concealed his past from the candidates committee of GroenLinks and five years later he kept integrity issues to himself before the candidates committee for the Senate. In 1998, the candidate committee for the municipal council in Assen was aware of Pormes’ trip to Yemen, but he left the committee in the dark about his (as far as can be proven, limited) involvement in the train hijacking at De Punt.
A year later, he defaulted on the candidates’ committee for the Senate, according to the researchers, by remaining silent about his past ‘when he was emphatically asked about it’.
Incorrect and incomplete
Things went wrong again in 2001, according to the 2005 report: ‘When he took office in the Senate in 2001, Sam Pormes made no statements about his past. He was forced to do so by questions from The Telegraph . In preparation for the press conference, he incorrectly and incompletely informed Wim de Boer (then chairman of the parliamentary group of the Senate, ed.).
On the wrong foot
In 2003 he presented his past as too rosy to another candidate committee for the Senate. He puts the committee ‘on the wrong foot’, according to the researchers.
Moluccan origin
After the report was published, Pormes was initially disbarred. Under pressure from the members’ council, he was allowed to stay. In NRC he blamed the ‘bullshit’ around his person in 2006 on his Moluccan origin. ‘If I had been Jan de Wit, things would have gone differently’.
Although his political career seemed to be over at that time, he returned in 2019 as a special committee member in the Drenthe states. There he was elected as a member of parliament in 2022. How long he will stay that way depends mainly on whether GroenLinks once again accepts that Pormes conceals incriminating information from him.