8 March 2007

AMSTERDAM - Ahmed Aboutaleb (Labour PvdA) lashed out at Geert Wilders on election day yesterday. In an emotional speech on Wednesday the new state secretary for social affairs took the occasion of election evening to say that the motion of no-confidence that Wilders levelled at him and fellow PvdA member Nebahat Albayrak was a "sign that you don't want to have confidence in people."

Aboutaleb said he had never felt so unsafe in the Netherlands as in the past days. He was not referring to any danger of attack on his person but rather to the "undercurrent in Dutch society that does not want me here."

Aboutaleb's outburst was remarkable since he has been nothing but cool, and sometimes even laconic, in response to the discussion that Wilders has incited. "But I have been thinking about it the past few days and getting increasingly angry about it."

[Copyright Expatica News + ANP 2007]

Subject: Dutch news