2024-02-02 11:04:00
The concerned citizens of ‘Health Before Everything’ make a cross every Saturday in front of the gate of Chemours. They have been protesting against pfas pollution for 200 weeks in a row. The camaraderie is great. ‘Taking action is almost starting to look like work, but it also gives energy.’
When Joop Keesmaat (71) from Sliedrecht walks out the front door for his weekly action against Chemours, his gaze first shifts over the river Beneden-Merwede. He was a maritime entrepreneur for many years. “This morning I saw my old tugboat passing by, the Neptun 11,” says Keesmaat – the boat has been sold due to retirement. Then the eyes quickly turn west, to the chemical factory of the American company on the other side of the water.
Like every Saturday morning, Keesmaat drives to a location in Sliedrecht to shovel soil. The car stops at a piece of grassland in a new residential area with a large mountain on top. Before you know it, seven colored buckets are lined up in a row, which Keesmaat fills with strong strokes. The experience shines through, although the shoes are a bit too nice for this job.
Companion Kees van der Hel (69) arrives there, he has picked up an anthropology student from Utrecht University from the station. She investigates the social consequences of pfas pollution, and is not the first scientist to find the protest against Chemours interesting. “Won’t you leave anything for me?” Van der Hel asks cheerfully when he sees that Keesmaat is already ready and helps lift the buckets into the car. The new button of their action group ‘Health Before Everything’ is already hanging on his jacket.
On to the 199th protest
Until recently they cleared the ground near the railway bridge, but that spot is now cordoned off with fences. “Possible to keep us out. I would welcome it if people removed contaminated soil for me,” says Van der Hel. He is referring to the persistent and harmful poly- and perfluoroalkyl substances, or PFAs, that have been discharged by Chemours and are in the ground and water. Then they cross the bridge to Dordrecht for the 199th protest.
The area in front of the factory gate has been cordoned off by the company with red and white ribbons. This creates a safe square for the protest, because the trucks cannot pass. It is quiet behind the gate, although there is probably an invisible doorman watching, through the glass of the gatehouse or via cameras. There are about 35 activists, a number that changes every week.
Inspired by the Silly Mothers from Argentina
“Maybe two thousand will come on Saturday,” Keesmaat suggests because of the number of Facebook followers of the action group. The 200th protest will then be celebrated with coffee and refreshments. Guests have also been invited, such as several Members of Parliament and ICU doctor Diederik Gommers, who as a local resident is involved in a lawsuit against Chemours.
Keesmaat came up with the bucket campaign in 2018. Inspired by the Argentinian Foolish Mothers, he decided that there should be a protest every week. ‘Some old men in the rain’ is how he summarizes that period. Corona caused an interruption twice.
The campaign has grown considerably since the TV programme Zembla last year revealed that Chemours had known for decades that certain pfas substances were harmful and yet continued to produce and discharge them. “Everyone is welcome as long as you adhere to our rules of action: be civilized and decent, we don’t want noise and fuss at the gate, and the police are your best friend,” says Van der Hel about the new addition. There are no police to be seen. He wouldn’t have much to do either.
Since the turnout has increased, Keesmaat starts the action with a speech to give the meeting structure. For this purpose they bought a sound system that he carries in a shopping bag. He welcomes all people as ‘beautiful people’, a reference to the hit by the late flower-power singer Melanie, and then talks about the biggest news of last week. “That was us.”
On the bus to the European Parliament
The action group went to Brussels with a bus full to speak with politicians such as MEP Mohammed Chahim (PvdA). There they advocated a quick and thorough ban on pfas.
“What did I learn from our Brussels trip? Well, simple, that we should also do something like that in The Hague. And that we should not look for political parties that agree with us, but rather for parties that are less interested in the pfas problem. I have listened to Chahim’s advice.”
He concludes his speech with the words “We Are Going to Win This!” and then everyone is invited to spread the soil they bring into a cross.
Almost a funeral ceremony
“This cross is a stop sign,” says Ineke de Ruijter, who is watching and was born and raised in Dordrecht. “Sometimes people add eggs and vegetables and fruit. It almost becomes a funeral ceremony.”
Some attendees say that they have lost loved ones due to cancer and make the connection with pfas. “There is almost no other explanation,” says De Ruijter. “I sometimes think about how many people around me have not lived to the age of seventy. Sometimes I read in the newspaper that we are all getting older and that society should be able to support this financially. Well, there aren’t that many state pensioners left in my area.”
Keesmaat also lost his wife to cancer. At a hearing of the Provincial Council about Chemours, he talked about pfas and its disease.
‘Disconcerting that there is pfas in agricultural products’
By the Zemblabroadcast is the genie out of the bottle, says De Ruijter, as she feels her feet getting colder. “The scales have fallen from people’s eyes. I was always very conscious about nutrition and got it from the neighborhood. But now I prefer to buy something in the supermarket that comes from far away. The disadvantage is that transport causes pollution.”
But how clean is the food from further away, Karel Thieme wonders. “You stand in front of the gate for three years and then you suddenly hear that there is PFAs in the farmers’ pesticides, that it is spread all over the country in the Netherlands,” he says indignantly. “I was shocked.”
“The average Dutch person thinks very empathetically about most messages about pfas: annoying for those people in Sliedrecht, and they give a thumbs up to such an article,” he continues. “But they don’t realize that this mess is all over the country.”
The drinking water company is across the street
Thieme knows a lot about water purification technology and worked for years as a professional tea taster. He points to the drinking water company across the street. Thieme does not trust that the drinking water is clean enough to drink. “Even though the RIVM and the water companies say that things are going well and politicians and the media parrot that.”
Did the protest help? “Over the past year there has been a real change in thinking about the consequences of pfas, those sickening emissions from Chemours, which has now led to a criminal complaint against that club,” says Keesmaat. Furthermore, ‘Health Before Everything’ has the impression that the actions have contributed to the province’s stricter attitude.
The factory does not have to close
“Our demand is not that the factory closes, but that production becomes clean,” says Willy Sweers, who now also belongs to the hard core. “Hence the slogan: ‘Zero from the pipe’. What bothers me is that this company has known for fifty years how harmful these products are, but they have never invested in alternative processes in their business operations. Such as a closed system and recycling.”
Chemours has a high safety culture, says Sweers. “If you walk somewhere where you have to wear a helmet and you scratch your head, you will be told. That’s good too. But at the same time, the following applies to emissions: what you don’t see doesn’t hurt you. That has to change.”
Another two hundred days of protest should not be necessary, says Keesmaat. “Things are moving now, hopefully we won’t have to wait another four years.” At the same time, they wouldn’t want to miss the camaraderie. “I have to be honest, it would almost be a shame if it were to stop,” says Van der Hel. “It’s just part of your Saturday morning now.”
“Taking action is almost starting to look like work, but it also gives energy,” says Keesmaat.
Suddenly a voice comes over the speakers, probably from the gatehouse next to the gate. Or they can’t even pack up and leave, because the trucks are waiting along the road. “This costs a lot of money,” says the voice. The sand cross will soon be shoveled away by Chemours employees. The remains of the previous protests lie a little further along the fence.
“We are also waiting for that factory to become clean,” says Van der Hel as the demonstrators say goodbye for a week.
Also read:
‘It is unpalatable that vegetables from your own garden and breast milk are dangerous’
The pressure on chemical company Chemours is growing now that it appears that the company knew that it was discharging toxic substances. The Christian Union is calling on Chemours in the Provincial Council.
Local residents must be better protected against emissions from factories
Better protection against industrial emissions is necessary and possible, says the Dutch Safety Board. But there is no incentive for this in the current system.
1706924256
#weeks #Joop #Keesmaat #shoveling #contaminated #soil #buckets #protest #Chemours