Research by de Volkskrant has revealed more information about abuses in the workplace of NOS Sport. The newspaper spoke to 32 employees and former employees in recent months. The article confirms the image of an unsafe working climate on the sports floor.
In a response to the article, the NOS management says it is ashamed of the described experiences, apologies are made again.
“It is still customary in the editorial office to speak openly about the appearance of female athletes and colleagues,” former employees told the newspaper. “With some regularity it was about whether you would ‘do her,'” said one of them. Sexually suggestive comments or jokes are the order of the day, the newspaper writes.
Several women are said to have received nicknames because of their breasts. A female employee is said to have been told: “You know that you are only here because you are a woman, it would have been even better if you had also been black”.
Jokes were also made about employees with a migration background or religious beliefs, the newspaper writes. Former presenter Aïcha Marghadi heard from a colleague with whom she had a conflict that she was an ‘excuse Moroccan’. Another former employee heard a colleague shout “Allahu akbar” when a footballer of Moroccan origin was shown a red card. An employee with an Asian background is said to have been called kroepoek, spring roll or peanut in the presence of colleagues.
Tom Eggers
A woman tells the Volkskrant about her experiences with presenter Tom Egbers. The woman started in 2005 as a 22-year-old on an internship at NOS Sport. Egbers (then in her late forties) started making advances, she told de Volkskrant. He called her and sent texts and e-mails during and after work. In the end, she falls for his advances. They kiss a few times and that’s it, the newspaper writes.
According to the intern, the situation escalated when Egbers’ wife, Janke Dekker, found out. Egbers would then have started bullying and intimidating the intern. In front of several colleagues, he would have called her “the serpent”, among other things. That behavior would have continued for almost two years. Eventually, the woman went to the editor-in-chief. He promised to talk to Egbers, but that would not have helped. A year later, the woman disappeared overnight, writes de Volkskrant.
Egbers says in the newspaper that he looks at the events of that time differently, but regrets it. “I deeply regret our relationship as such now, many years later,” he told the newspaper. “Because of the sadness that I caused in my private life. The fact that she was in her twenties at the time and I was in my forties is also very important to me, looking back after all these years.”
MORES
Until March, Egbers’ wife was chair of MORES, the reporting center for undesirable behavior in the cultural and creative sector. The fact that she was chairman would have been a reason for several employees recently not to go to MORES. They do not trust that their complaints will be handled independently there, according to de Volkskrant.
Egbers’ wife is scheduled to return to MORES in April. The reporting center previously stated that Dekker’s decision is “absolutely unrelated” to the investigation.
Aicha Marghadi
The newspaper also features former presenter (2010-2012) Aïcha Marghadi. She says in the newspaper that the editors-in-chief were initially happy with her arrival, but that the reception on the floor was cool. “Actually, Aïcha had no chance from the moment she first walked onto the editorial floor,” says a former colleague. “She was both a woman and a person of color and an outsider.”
Marghadi also talks about her experience with Jack van Gelder, who spoke about it yesterday in the TV program HLF8. Marghadi wanted to ask Van Gelder if he wanted to be her mentor. When she called him about it, Van Gelder said she was taking a bath. Van Gelder asked if she wanted to lie down for a while.
Three former colleagues confirm to the newspaper that Marghadi was bullied. “Everyone was asked to join them for lunch, except Aïcha”. Someone who still works there is ashamed that he or she did not stand up for Marghadi.
Not everyone agrees. Others believe that Marghadi made herself impossible, did not act modestly and isolated herself.
Confidential advisor
Yesterday it was announced that the editor-in-chief of NOS Sport will retire in due course. The reason is an inventory by an external confidential adviser of reports of inappropriate behavior by employees. The confidential advisor’s report contains reports of bullying, (sexual) intimidation, discrimination, verbal aggression and integrity issues.
The confidential advisor was commissioned because of the unrest in the editorial office after reports last year about an unsafe work culture at the TV program De Wereld Draait Door. The editors-in-chief of NOS Sport were then accused of not doing anything for years with similar complaints to their own editorial staff.
Reaction NOS management
The NOS management has responded to tonight’s newspaper article. “We are ashamed of the experiences we read in de Volkskrant. We once again offer our sincere apologies to everyone who has experienced this.”
The management will talk to everyone mentioned in the article. NOS director Gerard Timmer says that the examples in the newspaper confirm the picture that emerged from the inventory of the confidential advisor. “This shows once again that there is real work to be done, and that what happened in the past must never happen again.”
When asked, NOS spokesman Koen Adriaanse does not say whether Tom Egbers will present NOS Studio Sport Eredivisie this weekend.
- Cycling analyst Marijn de Vries: NOS Sport did nothing with my report of misconduct
- Jack van Gelder reports involvement in two incidents NOS Sport
- NOS Sport editor-in-chief steps down after years of cases of transgressive behavior
