Alina Totti (38) is standing under a suspended ceiling in Son. Her party, D66, is holding a meeting for ‘internationals’. In addition to Totti, there are four other non-Dutch people. A British man talks about the most entertaining moment in the run-up to the elections. He unfolds an imaginary newspaper. The number of candidates and parties he reads about makes him dizzy. He receives support from his neighbor: “It is a minefield.”
The Romanian Totti is number seven on the list in Eindhoven, bordering the municipality of Son en Breugel. In the village hall, where the meeting is held, D66 party leader Bas Heinrichs says that it is “insanely difficult” to reach non-Dutch people who are allowed to vote. He has written to all major companies in the area. His group has advertised on the street and online. The municipality does nothing, says Heinrichs.
Heinrichs received negative reactions from Son to the announcement of the meeting in the village hall. “The sentiment here is that ASML employees buy all the houses with their much too high salaries.” In the past, Son and Breugel, together one municipality, were church villages. Now they are commuter villages, separated by the Dommel that continues to Eindhoven. More and more expats live throughout the region, working at ASML or other companies.
The number of expats who are allowed to vote is growing. They receive a voting card for the municipal elections if they are EU citizens or if they have been in the Netherlands for at least five years and have a residence permit. The municipality does not keep track of how many non-Dutch people are allowed to vote in Son en Breugel. In Eindhoven, almost thirty thousand non-Dutch people are allowed to vote, accounting for seven of the 45 seats.
Difficult to get to the polls
It seems difficult to get international voters to the polls, wrote researchers from Utrecht University after the previous municipal elections. It shows that they experience little connection with local themes and notice a high language and information barrier Eurecaproject, a study of European citizenship.
D66 candidate Totti lived in eight countries, he wrote The New York Times and worked for the European Parliament. Seven years ago she came to the Netherlands for love. Totti lives on Strijp-S, the old Philips factory site that has been transformed into a trendy residential area with high residential towers. There, she says, she gets the feeling that she is living in an international region where Europe’s technological future is being built to compete with China and the United States.
Expats should not complain if they do not vote, says candidate councilor Alina Totti of D66.
Photo Merlin Daleman
Expats will vote if they are involved in their environment, Totti said earlier in a coffee shop on Strijp-S. And when they feel part of the community. After her relationship ended, she was lonely and depressed, and for the first year and a half she could not find work in the Netherlands. When she was able to start working in the province of North Brabant, a world opened up for her.
Totti uses all kinds of meetings in the region, such as those in Son en Breugel, to campaign. And she goes door to door. “We are the party that loves internationals,” she told an Indian couple who did not know they could vote.
Decent work is, from her own experience, her spearhead. For expat wives, for example. “The more unhappy they become, the sooner they will convince their partners to move. That is a loss for the companies that bring people here.” And for the most invisible group: exploited migrant workers, such as from her home country Romania. She recognizes them, an Andrei or a Mihai who sleep in parking garages such as at Strijp-S, sooner than Dutch candidates. And she knows what they left behind.
It is “insanely difficult” to reach non-Dutch people who are allowed to vote, which is why D66 organizes information evenings.
Photo Merlin Daleman
When expats complain, Totti reminds them of their voting rights. At the very least, she tells the other attendees, they should know which parties want them in the Netherlands and which do not. Totti tells her story in English, because it makes her appear more professional. If she joins the council, she will have to speak Dutch, she knows. If expats drive the economy forward, Totti says, they should also help shape democracy.
Taking the lead
According to the Eureca project, municipalities must take the lead in informing non-Dutch people about the elections. Recommendations include an English-language gateway and an active approach to internationals. Son en Breugel only has an election page in English that is automatically translated from Dutch. The latter municipality also organized an English-language meeting in the library about the elections and gave presentations at a meeting in January for the Indian community and at ASML.
Most expats in Eindhoven and the surrounding area come from India. Nearly ten thousand Indians live in the city. Three Indians can be found on the candidate lists for the elections, of which Chaitali Sengupta occupies the highest position. She is at 14 for CDA. Four years ago, the party was surprised that it received so many votes (119).
Sengupta waves to an Indian couple from a terrace in Meerhoven, the new residential area of Eindhoven where many expats live. Twenty-six years ago she followed her husband to Eindhoven from Calcutta, with a master’s degree in English language and literature. She learned Dutch quickly, but she could not connect with the Dutch. A career coach advised her to study finance, so she did and then worked for Rabobank, ABN-Amro and Philips.
Until six years ago, when she saw Indians at work struggling with the language barrier. Sengupta started teaching them language and quit her job. In recent years she successfully helped 166 Indians with the integration course.
Sengupta notices that Indians do not always know how elections work
She wants to build cultural bridges. She conducted a survey among Indians about what concerns them in Eindhoven. Safety was number one, they are concerned about burglaries. Second is inclusion, the desire to be included in society. Living on three. She understands Eindhoven residents who are concerned that expats will be given priority for housing. Sengupta does not want to pit the groups against each other, but wants to continue building homes. Other wishes from the Indian community are: organizing events such as food festivals (but they don’t know where to start) and building a temple for their religious activities in Meerhoven.
Her election poster hangs in Indian shops in Eindhoven. Sengupta notices that Indians do not always know how elections work. She was asked whether they should put a cross in the voting booth or color in the box. Some say: these are just local elections, what influence do they have? An Indian man said to her: I have nothing to complain about, why should I vote?
