NOS News editor-in-chief Marcel Gelauff deliberately does not allow journalists from his organization to join De Vooravond. He says this in a response to an angry tweet from Fidan Ekiz who presents the BNNVara program. But the why is different, according to Gelauff, than Ekiz claims.
“Inexistent and incomprehensible how Marcel Gelauff has forbidden journalists from the NOS for the entire Eve season to join us because of his unwelcome opinions,” Fidan Ekiz writes on Twitter. Since the end of August, she has been presenting, together with Renze Klamer, the daily program that is broadcast on NPO 1 at the old place of De Wereld Draait Door (DWDD).
“That is really incorrect,” says Gelauff. “With every new TV program I always say: let’s see how it develops before we accept an invitation. And it really develops into an opinion-forming program. There is nothing wrong with that in itself; it is a legitimate journalistic form. But then the question is whether NOS people, who operate completely objectively, fit in with that. ”
Even before the first episode of De Vooravond, the presenters announced how the roles would be divided. Klamer would mainly take control and keep an eye on the script. And Ekiz: “That freer role, being a little more the opinion maker; therein lies my strength. I should definitely not be involved in the administration. ”
Unwelcome
“As a NOS, do you have to be in a strong opinion program?” Gelauff asks. “Right now I say ‘no’. Maybe that will be different in the future. ” The editor-in-chief gives some other reasons. “We often reject such requests. With our volume, we also want to be very selective in which program we want and can participate in. But that certainly has nothing to do with the opinions there being unwelcome to me. I think it’s going a long way to throw that into the world in a tweet. ”
NOS reporters did sometimes pop up in DWDD. Because this was a less opinionated program? Gelauff does not want to go into that question too much. “Then you end up with the difficult discussion of exactly how to define” opinionally “. It is about the atmosphere and the approach of a program. And whether you help the mission of the NOS if one of us is there. That’s not the case with De Vooravond at the moment. ”
Fidan Ekiz, in turn, reacts with amazement to Gelauff’s statements. “It’s just completely ridiculous what he says. We had a number of NOS people on the board who would actually come. Until I said in the broadcast that I think the Geert Wilders case is a political trial. Almost immediately afterwards, everyone was withdrawn. And that boycott has remained, because today we would also have someone seconded by the NOS at the table and that was also suddenly called off. ”
“So it is definitely about opinions that Gelauff does not like,” Ekiz continues. “That is impossible, this is really going too far. We don’t live in North Korea. I was often more opinionated as a table lady in DWDD than I am now. And there I was just sitting at the table with NOS people. Or someone from the NOS was a table lady. And he sat there to give an opinion. ”
