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August 30, 2006
Netherlands: Politician Facing Islamic Threats Gets No Campaign Security Help
Before Ayaan Hirsi Ali left Holland to work in America, she shared one thing in common with another member of the Dutch parliament, Geert Wilders. Both were recipients of open death threats from Muslims. When the film-maker Theo van Gogh was killed in a street by Islamist Mohamed Bouyeri on November 2, 2004, a note was pinned to his chest with a knife. This note threatened Hirsi Ali and Wilders with death.
At the end of March this year, there had been a total of 121 recorded death threats made against Wilders and Ali.
Wilders, like Hirsi Ali, had been forced to go into hiding since van Gogh's murder, and only emerges into the public eye when accompanied by bodyguards. Like Hirsi Ali, Wilders had been a member of parliament, representing the Liberal Party, or VVD. However, he resigned from the party in late 2004 because of his opposition to Turkey gaining accession to the European Union.
With elections soon coming up, Wilders has founded his own party, the Party for Freedom (pvdV). But he has had to cancel a recent campaign meeting which was planned in the town of Holten yesterday, because his bodyguards said that it was unsafe. SImilarly, he has been forced to abandon a meeting in Friesland, for the same reasons.
Expatica reports that WIlder's bodyguards insist that all people attending any meetings must firstly pass through an electronic gate, which detects metal objects. To hire just one of these for one night costs 1,000 Euros ($1,283), and Wilders does not have the funds to afford these.
He told 'De Volkskrant' newspaper: "We don't have that. We are a small party. This means the end of my campaign."
He has requested assistance from the Justice Ministry, but they have refused to help. A spokesman has said that parties should be responsible for their own security.
Parliament has already supported the notion of security for Mr Wilders' campaign. Frans Weisglas, the parliament chairman, has said: "We believe the government must ensure that everyone can conduct a campaign in all freedom. Money should not be an obstacle."
This month, the broadcaster TROS cancelled an appearance by Geert Wilders because of the high costs of security. Now Mr Wilders is hoping that the Justice Minister himself, Piet Hein Donner, will intervene to allow security funding.
Posted by Giraldus Cambrensis at August 30, 2006 9:19 PM
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