New Year’s Eve association De Geitefok from Oldeberkoop has stolen the large luminous letters from the Top 2000 Café in Hilversum. The letters were on the Media Park and were stolen in the night from Wednesday to Thursday.
The letters were in front of the door of Sound & Vision, where the Top 2000 Café is, but now it only says ‘2000’. The letters T, O and P have disappeared. NPO Radio 2 reported the theft. De Geitefok announced on Friday afternoon that it was behind the theft of the three letters.
The New Year’s Eve association hoped to ‘put their own region on the map with large letters’ by stealing the letters. According to chairman Jan-Bart Hof, De Geitefok wanted to send a signal that the Netherlands is bigger than just the Randstad. NPO, however, filed a report on Thursday and the police also announced that they wanted to prosecute the New Year’s Eve association.
Andre Hazes
De Geitefok has been stealing public objects around the turn of the year for years, as part of a “stunt”. For example, in 2021 the Lego statue of André Hazes on Dam Square in Amsterdam was taken, in 2018 the ‘I’ of the I amsterdam logo and in 2011 the rings of the Olympic Stadium in Amsterdam.
The thefts provide the police with a lot of unnecessary extra work, a spokesman said. De Geitefok decided on Friday to put the letters back in Hilversum in the morning of December 31. Normally, a stunt is presented on New Year’s Eve and brought back in the new year, but this has been brought forward by a day in consultation with the parties involved.