Nigeria: Dutch parties demand Nigerian gang police force

Calling the Ambassador

This is a very worrisome development that requires some action and activity from the official representation of Nigeria in the Netherlands; it must be debunked and condemned forthwith.

Whilst there might be cases of criminal conduct by aliens in the Netherlands, the idea that Nigerians can be singularly identified as a group that specifically requires the establishment of a permanent police force [1] to monitor and investigate their activities is outright discrimination and disconcerting.

This populist demand by right-leaning parties as the CDA, VVD & PVV to the Justice Minister to establish a permanent police force with Nigerian-criminal-gang tinted-glasses does not augur well for the improvement of relations between the Netherlands and Nigeria.

Nationality must not matter

Criminals should be treated as criminals and afforded the full scrutiny of the law and justice processes regardless of where they are from; the whole idea of a Nigerian crime squad is a fallacy that portends that Nigerians have more criminality than other nationalities.

It does not seem there is consideration for the fact that other black Africans can feign Nigerian-hood just as Nigerians can seek to deny that they are from Nigeria for all sorts of reasons.

One does wonder what will happen if other nationalities create the perception that they have a criminality quotient higher than a presumed norm. Would these parties also demand a British gang squad, a Polish gang squad or even a Serbian gang squad?

A level investigation field

There probably is a case for establishing and a serious crime squad to deal with particular kinds of crimes, to establish such a squad to target nationalities smacks of populist racist intent and it does not augur well for society.

There are enough laws in the land to deal with criminals, but it is not enough for suspects who have not been through the legal and justice process to be branded undesirable aliens, just on suspicion rather than legally tested evidence of the suspicion leading to conviction; where that would then make them undesirable aliens and hence candidates for deportation.

Leaning to the populist

The names of the parties calling for this atrocious exercise belie a false sense security and tolerance; the Christian Democratic Appeal (CDA) as the majority party in the ruling coalition does not necessarily exhibit a Christianly approach to justice as it panders backward-looking to Calvinism rhetoric.

The Party for Freedom (PVV), lead by Geert Wilders is hardly about freedom but populist doctrine that aims to fracture society and community.

The People’s Party for Freedom and Democarcy (VVD) used to be the haven for Rita Verdonk (Lady Oddjob), it is supposed to be a liberal leaning party, but they have been anything but liberal in their policies and pronouncements.

Sources

[1] News Dutch MPs demand crackdown on Nigerian gangs - News from The Netherlands – Expatica

Parents of kids on booze should do time

The untouchable subject

Combining the right of centre demagoguery of the Christian Democratic Appeal ruling party with that of its second coalition party of the Christian Union; might just be like approaching the mount that cannot be touched or hearing terrifying sounds like roaring thunder.

There is no doubt that they both want to take our liberal Dutch society to Calvinist subservience where we all knew our places and let the social hand of authority and benevolence guide us to where we would fear no more.

There is no doubt however the age of alcoholic consumption initiation is falling like meteors to as low as it can be causing great concern.

Only recently a mother who provided alcohol for her 16 year old's birthday party got severely sanctioned that she would spend 2 years in prison in the United States. It was harsh, but I am hardly sympathetic about it.

Some countries have been considering bringing parents to book for allowing their children to consume alcohol and whilst we do not have laws prohibiting the use of alcohol in the home, some responsibility must surely be borne by parents for children who end up consuming alcohol in public.

Drug and alcohol fuelled

When 3 kids beat me up in December 2004, I should have known better to run for dear life when one of them picked up a bicycle and threw it at me. It should have occurred to me that only a drink and drug fuelled temperament would allow for such an exhibition of lunacy.

Basically juvenile alcoholism is a growing and serious problem; it is hitting our streets in the most unacceptable way, so as Dickensian as the plan of the governing parties might sound; breathalysing juveniles might be a welcome development - if they are immediately taken off the streets and their parents seriously inconvenienced as a deterrent with the kids put through a strict discipline and drying-out programme.

The extension to this is the rising violence of kids of immigrant descent who happen to now harbour less liberal values than their parents or the society in which they were born - they have taken to harassing other minorities, especially homosexuals, two of whom got beaten up on a popular gay street, in fact, there has been a rise in homophobic attacks in Amsterdam of late.

That should put paid to the idea of Amsterdam being the Gay capital of Europe.

Thankfully, the kids, 6 of them and all of foreign descent Morocco (4), Suriname (1) and Turkey (1) were apprehended by the police with the notice that they are repeat offenders in this atrocious banditry.

The study that most juvenile offenders use drugs and alcohol has long been read and digested, we now need some serious community action to curb these rotten activities before our peaceful cities get overrun with juveniles imitating lowlifes.

No voting advice for our Dear Dutch Leader

Tell me who

The Dutch political season in readiness for the November 22^nd elections continues apace with the launch of StemWijzer (Dutch). StemWijzer is an online voters’ advisory that poses questions to the participant to help them determine if they are conservative, liberal, libertarian, socialist, communist or whatever political shade you might be, it now has a more European outlook called VoteMatch.

Then it advises on which of the 26 or so parties the participant should vote for at election, offering second and third choices depending on how the questions are answered.

As I have lamented before, our Western democracies are failing because of the failure of education and the lack of understanding of how to read party policies and ideologies and how to match that with personal political slant and thinking.

People think they are liberal and end up being classified as intolerant and right-wing, some who are right-wing end up in another political spectrum, how does one begin to appreciate ones political temperament and convert that into an effective democratic voice?

Bad system or lacking an ideology

Worse still is when StemWijzer cannot offer an opinion as what party you can vote for, when this happens to the person who has been Prime Minister of the Netherlands for the past four years, questions should be asked.

The Prime Minister is leader of the right of centre CDA, which would be nominally conservative, could it be that Stemwijzer is seriously flawed or we have a leadership without an ideology?

I do not have to answer that question because the Prime Minister himself says and I quote, “StemWijzer provided good support for people in making a well-motivated choice”. But for some reason, StemWijzer could not even find a neutral or nonchalant choice for our Dear Leader.

Other leaders like the leader of the Liberal party (VVD) was advised to vote for the progressive-liberal D66. The leader of the Labour Party (PVDA) however, was true to his party and ideology – he probably should be the next Prime Minister of the Netherlands.

References

Dutch election news - Part I