Feedback 26 september 2020
Akwasi has to be careful not to start an excuse broadcaster. After all, this remains the Netherlands.
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With his broadcaster Zwart, Akwasi works in a very Dutch way. He follows in the footsteps of titans such as Father Lambert Perquin (KRO), Rev. Everard Spelberg (VPRO) or Jan Broekz. (VARA), essential designers of the Dutch broadcasting industry.
Almost a hundred years ago, a commercial party delivered radio to the Netherlands. The Nederlandsche Seintoestellen Fabriek in Hilversum – later bought by Philips – built a transmitter to be able to sell more radio equipment and parts. After all, then there was something to listen to on their products. It should not all cost too much and that is why the first program leader Willem Vogt founded an association of eavesdroppers, all of which had to pay a contribution. It was called the Algemene Vereniging Radio Omroep (AVRO). The Seintoestellenfabriek was also willing to rent the transmitter to other providers, the Association of Workers Radio Amateurs (VARA), the Vrijzinnig Protestantse Radio Omroep (VPRO) and the Freethinkers Radio Omroep. Pastors and pastors looked with sorrow at the voices in the living room over which they had no control. This is how the Catholic Radio Broadcaster (KRO) and the Nederlandsch Christelijke Radio Vereeniging (NCRV) came into being. Together they built their own transmission installation in Huizen near Hilversum
Politics started to interfere in the course of events. Willem Vogt regarded the AVRO as a national organization that transcends all philosophies of life and was therefore entitled to all broadcasting time. He received support from the liberals and the daily newspaper De Telegraaf.
In The Hague, the Christian parties had the absolute majority. So nothing came of it. In 1930 the foundation was laid for the current system. The state provided the transmission equipment. The broadcasting time was neatly distributed among the existing broadcasters. During the German occupation, Seyss-Inquart introduced the listening fee to finance this system. He replaced the broadcasters with a Nederlandsche Omroep with a national-socialist timbre. They came back after the war. The listening money remained. Every radio owner received an annual bill. Television fees were introduced for owners of television. Advantage: for example, the government could not influence the programming via the money tap. Unfortunately, this came to an end at the turn of the century and the game has been on the wagon ever since. The broadcasters are increasingly on the defensive. VVD politician Sander Dekker even forced a number of mergers because this would be more efficient. Nevertheless, the system still bears the characteristics of 1930. However, newly founded broadcasters since the 1960s can join the system if they are able to recruit enough members. As a result, De EO, Omroep Max or the TROS, for example, were able to join the order.
It is Akwasi’s intention to give people of color a clear place in the broadcasting time of the Public Broadcasting. In this respect, he compares himself to the Catholics, Protestants, freethinkers and Social Democrats who pursued the same goal almost a century ago. That was a huge success. The broadcasters each had their own massive following among the listeners. They, in turn, knew how to find the programs that best suited their philosophy of life, as it was difficult to find with crowd pullers such as VARAs Showboat of Nine father the clock of the KRO.
You could tell from the background of the artists. In Negen heit de Klok you could hear musicians and comedians with a Catholic background. The stars of Showboat usually had something of the PvdA or they were like Wim Sonnevelt, certainly not churchgoers, not to mention his great secret that many knew but about which everyone remained silent. To put it modern, the odds were you in your own bubble. And not beyond. Then you got raised eyebrows and the question whether you had not walked in through the wrong door.
This danger threatens Akwasi. It will take him no effort to find enough talent if he turns out to be a unifying figure who allows talents to blossom around him instead of modeling them after his own mold. Then he becomes a kind of Jan Slagter.
At the same time, there is a good chance that people of color will automatically end up with Omroep Zwart, just like the Catholics at the time with the KRO. He then becomes the founder of a new division, not on a philosophical basis, but on an ethnic basis. As a white person you belong to AVRO / Tros and associates, the Dutch of color will join Omroep Zwart. Such an ethnic division is not new: it has existed in Suriname for some seventy years. Only the populism of Desi Bouterse has succeeded in breaking through the boundaries thus raised between population groups.
Thus, Akwasi becomes a twenty-first century version of Father Perquin who tried to unite all Catholics under one roof to make their sound sound on the ether. Or a modern pastor Spelberg.
A pure, flawless Dutchman is that boy, with his legs pulled deep into the swampy polder soil. His initiative opens one door but slams the other with a bang. He must be careful not to start an excuse broadcaster. After all, this remains the Netherlands.
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