NRC-journalists Merijn Rengers, Stijn Bronzwaer and Joris Kooiman have won the journalistic prize De Loep for their book The machine about Booking.com in the category of signaling investigative journalism. The Association of Investigative Journalists (VVOJ) announced this on Friday evening. The book describes the growth and moral decline of Booking, full of extravagant parties, internet experiments that got out of hand, cheated shareholders, pawing managers and quarrels in the boardroom. Before and after they wrote their book, the trio published several stories in NRC about the abuses at the hotel booking site.
Also read: How Booking Discovered A US Spy In Its Systems (And Said Nothing To The Clients)
De Loep in the investigative journalism category went to de Volkskrant-journalists Frank Hendrickx and Tom Kreling for the book Sywert’s secret corona deals† The Flemish journalists Ruben Brugnera and Marieke Brugnera van Knack won the prize in the category of investigative investigative journalism for their revelations about the Belgian homeless organization Poverello†
Incentive prize and oeuvre prize
The incentive prize for talents up to thirty years old went to Marieke Rotman, Romy van der Burgh, Esther Chavannes, Gina Lafour and Allart van der Woude for their story ‘How the Christian anti-abortion lobby is quietly gaining a foothold’ in The Green Amsterdammerwhich came about after an undercover investigation.
NRCjournalist Joep Dohmen was presented with his oeuvre prize on Friday evening in Antwerp. At the beginning of June, the jury of De Loep already announced that Dohmen would receive this prize, because she considers it important to express her support and great appreciation for one of the top investigative journalists of The Netherlands.”