Parliamentary debate on the cover-up of NPO whistleblowers

There will be a plenary debate in the House of Representatives on the NPO cover-up, on a whistleblower. A high-ranking NPO employee wanted to report salary cap abuse, but was referred to Marjan Hammersma, the top civil servant in the Ministry of Education, Culture and Science, who had a private relationship with Shula Rijxman, then the NPO’s top woman.

After the conversation with Hammersma, there was no follow-up to the conversation. The “close relationship” that Rijxman and Hammersma had revealed in the BNR podcast Koster en Van Dijk. The whistleblower was unaware of the private relationship of the two top women. “If I had known about the private relationship, I never would have had the conversation,” the whistleblower told BNR.

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People in The Hague are surprised at the way this whistleblower has been treated. Pieter Omtzigt has already asked parliamentary questions. The VVD and the CDA, whose deputies put the whistleblower in contact with Arie Slob, the minister in charge at the time, are also surprised at the state of play. This is reason enough for the House of Representatives to debate it in plenary. “From left to right, from the SP to the PVV and the Forum for Democracy, people want a debate,” says Mark Koster, who, together with Ton F. van Dijk, produces the Koster and Van Dijk podcast.

Read also | Secretary of State wants to ‘look internally’ at whistleblower’s affairs

PVV deputy Martin Bosma is the initiator of the debate. It is not yet known when the debate will take place.