Mart Smeets pretends that he always had one during his TV career gentleman has been, but more and more stories are now emerging about alleged misconduct. “You dirty, rotten dog!”
The story of Aïcha Marghadi, who was ridiculed by Mart Smeets, has caused quite a stir. It is not considered normal to insult someone in front of an entire editorial team. If someone wants to get to know you by extending a hand, it goes way too far to shout, like Mart: “What should we do with this?”
Never met
Catherine Keyl recognizes herself in Aïcha’s story and says she was also treated in an ugly way by Mart. And BNR presenter Jelle Maasbach knows a witness of extreme misconduct by Mart. He would have cursed someone completely on the newsroom floor.
Now singer Henk Westbroek also reports. “I worked at VARA in 1982 or 1983 or maybe a little later,” he begins in his podcast Another Podcast. “I had never met Mart Smeets, never said anything about him, never had any contact with him. I had a radio program and in the evening we were recording a program. De Popkrant.”
Dirty rotten dog
And who walks down the hall one day? “Mart Smeets. So I say to him: ‘Hello Mr. Smeets.’ Do you know how he reacted? (Starts screaming, ed.) ‘Who the hell do you think you are? Dirty rotten dog. Who do you think… Saying hello to me!’ And I think: that man is joking, so I start laughing.”
Henk thought it was a bad joke. “I think: he’s really trying… Not that nice, but hey, I sometimes make jokes that aren’t funny. So I start laughing. ‘How dare you laugh! Shall I beat your ass?’ I think: he really means it. And then I thought: I come from a slum, and you may have played basketball, but I will bite your ears off.”
Fighting outside
It unleashed the fighting spirit in Henk. “I thought: I’m going to kick your balls to the back of your throat. I said, ‘Well, you know what, Mr. Smeets? If you want to fight so badly, let’s walk outside. Otherwise I’ll beat you all the way down the hall. What you want. You want it so bad, I won’t say no.’ He walked on and never spoke to me again.”
And then? “He hated me all his life and gossiped about me a lot. Never played a song of mine on the radio, and he had many a music program, because yes, I was someone who did not let him bully him.”
Always polite
According to Henk, no excuses were ever made. “I met him years later, less than two years ago I think, on a talk show. I say: ‘Gosh, hello Mr. Smeets.’ I always remain very polite. Him too: ‘Hello Henk.’”
Henk said that he had made a song about cycling. “Well, I don’t know that,” Smeets replied. Would he listen to it sometime? “Well, I don’t know if I want to.”