Two VSP councillors at VU Amsterdam arrested

During a drinks reception organised by the student council of VU Amsterdam, the chairperson and founder of VSP began singing a Nazi song alongside another member of his party.

Later that evening, at a campus bar, a board member of the SRVU student union confronted the two students about this. The discussion escalated, and one of the VSP members poured beer over the SRVU member's head. When the latter retaliated, the VSP member grabbed him and pushed his head against the floor several times, according to reports published by Ad Valvas and Het Parool.

The other VSP member allegedly threatened the victim, an international student of non-Western origin, saying that he would be "deported". The police were called, but the VSP members fled. Two arrests have been made after that. According to Het Parool, one of the people arrested is the chair of the VSP party.

Intimidated
VSP is a controversial group. The party was founded in 2023 and is also represented on the university councils of Utrecht and Leiden. VSP says it is committed to "academic freedom" and "diversity of thought". But, according to Peter Breedveld, editor-in-chief of the VU Amsterdam university magazine Ad Valvas, VSP is actually "a typical right-wing reactionary movement railing against 'woke'".

Ad Valvas has written about VSP on several occasions: "The chairman is not particularly fond of LGBTQ people," says Breedveld. "He keeps talking about the pride library or the pride flag. It comes up again and again."

VSP did not like Ad Valvas' reporting. The party wanted the editors to remove an article about them from the website, but Breedveld refused. "They were given plenty of time to respond at the time, but they didn't want to."

"They intimidated us," he says. "Not with violence, but they called me from an anonymous number to provoke me and then recorded a tiny snippet of this conversation, making it seem as if I was swearing at them, and posted it on Instagram. They also made a GIF of my image."

Report
Breedveld decided to report the incident to the police for defamation and slander: "I consider this a form of intimidation. They tried to discredit me. But, after a few weeks, I was told that there was not enough evidence, even though I had submitted the video."

VSP has also written personal messages about Breedveld. "For example, they say that I am extremely left-wing and that I should not be working for Ad Valvas. They say it is a disgrace that I work for VU. If you ask VSP even the slightest critical question, they try to discredit you. This has been going on for three years."

Distressed
The investigation is still ongoing, according to the police. At a later stage, the case will be transferred to the Public Prosecution Service, which will decide whether to proceed with prosecution.

VU Amsterdam regrets the situation: "We are very distressed that this has happened on our campus and take the situation very seriously," writes the university. Asked to react, VSP did not respond.