Rutger Castricum is the last to speak to Prime Minister Mark Rutte in public before his historic sick report. “It’s really weird. I didn’t notice anything at all.”
Mark Rutte is ill for the first time in his twelve years as prime minister. The debate that was scheduled for yesterday about the results of the Provincial Council elections has therefore been postponed to today, at eleven o’clock. “It is completely unique that Rutte is ill, it has never even happened before,” says BNR political reporter Mats Akkerman.
Rutger noticed nothing
Just before Rutte’s historic sick report, the prime minister spoke with political journalist Rutger Castricum. “It’s really weird because I got him this morning… I think I’m the last guy who spoke to him,” he said. HLF8 from last night.
Rutte spent almost all day on the toilet ‘because I probably ate something wrong’. Rutger: “Actually, I didn’t notice anything about him. That’s very special. He was reasonably fit and was also nice and of course came back with his usual answers.”
“Does it make you sick?”
HLF8 presenter Sam Hagens: “We have a picture of it. So at that time it was not yet known that he was ill, but your first question was very appropriate.”
Rutger to Rutte: “It is of course always about that gap: people who do not understand what is happening here. You will gradually become a little sick of it. But do you actually still understand what is going on?”
The Prime Minister: “I hope so, yes.”
Diarrhea
Sam doesn’t think it’s surprising that Rutger couldn’t see anything about Rutte. “The thing is with diarrhea or food poisoning: then you don’t see it, but he does walk very fast.”
Rutger: “I saw no trace!”
Fellow guest Filemon Wesselink: “It’s the first time he’s been sick, isn’t it?”
Sam: “That never happens.”
Yesim Candan: “I think he looks really sick. Yes, really not good.”
Rutger spoke to Rutte for his TV program De Hofbar on NPO 2. 305,000 people watched it late last night.
Fragment
Consternation about sick Rutte: