Geert Wilders adopts a cause but drops it just as easily if it doesn’t sit well with his fight against Islam and Europe, writes Jan-Jaap de Ruiter.

When news came that four Nigerians had been flogged for being gay, I immediately took to Twitter to find out what Geert Wilders had to say about it. The PVV leader’s heartfelt indignation would undoubtedly be poured into every single one of the 140 characters allowed him. But there was nothing. His last Tweet was about the €11bn Europe is going to hand over to Ukraine,  a ‘complete waste of money’, of course.

Geert’s timeline

I went a bit further down Wilders’ timeline. Around February 24, the papers were reporting on the new Ugandan anti-gay legislation which will make life unbearable for gays in that country, forcing many to go to ground or leave the country altogether. It provoked not even the smallest Tweet from the blonde one.

Lesser PVV gods

On to the PVV website. This yields some results. In December 2013, PVV MP Jorum van Klaveren asked the education minister and the foreign trade and aid minister about the ‘lifelong incarceration of gays in Uganda’, and on January 2011, parliamentary questions were asked by (former) PVV MPs Louis Bontes and Johan Driessen about the murder of Ugandan gay rights activist David Kato. Well done.

But Bontes was kicked out of the parliamentary party, Driessen is largely unknown and Van Klaveren’s question never made it into the newspapers. The fact is that the PVV is Geert Wilders’ own private enterprise. His actions and comments take centre stage.

Wilders keeps silent

Wilders hasn’t said a word about the persecution of gays in Uganda in public and I have yet to hear him about the flogging of the four men in Nigeria. Wilders remains silent, although the men were condemned by an Islamic court. You would think that a man whose existence revolves around fighting Islam wouldn’t hesitate to speak out. But he didn’t. What a waste of an excellent opportunity.

Uganda’s anti-gay legislation is different. It is inspired, among other things, by evangelical preachers from the United States. Christianity is the dominant religion in Uganda and is deeply rooted in society, with all the hatred of gays that this apparently implies. Is that a reason to remain silent? It seems it is.

Party ideologist Martin Bosma has made it abundantly clear that his party is very attached to Christian norms and values. But we also know that the party enjoys the financial sympathy of right-wing forces in the United States who, in the main, are Christian and anti-gay. Another reason to keep quiet, it would seem.  

The PVV’s anti-gay allies

And then there’s the European elections. The PVV is allying itself with parties like Vlaams Belang and Front National. Neither party is known for its pro-gay or pro-gay marriage stance. Front National de la Jeunesse director Julien Rochedy, who is a candidate for the local council elections in Montélimar, said in a radio programme that he would favour anti-gay legislation on the Russian model in France. It is the battle against Europe which is creating these unholy alliances and public calls to support gay rights in Uganda and Nigeria don’t fit in. Another reason not to say anything perhaps?

Tea and no sympathy

In September 2011, Wilders visited a gay couple who had been forced to leave their home by bullying youths with an ethnic minority background. He even dedicated a Tweet to it. Now he doesn’t say a word.

I think Geert Wilders’ PVV showed its true colours a long time ago. The stance Wilders is taking now only serves to illustrate once again that he is no more than an opportunist who will abandon groups he has courted before, in this case gays, at the drop of a hat if they stand in the way of his fight against Islam and Europe. The Jewish vote he envisaged was discarded when he backed a ban on ritual slaughter.

How much evidence do people need?

Jan-Jaap de Ruiter is a researcher in Arabic Studies at Tilburg University.

@Janjaapderuiter

FB: facebook.com/janjaap.deruiter.1

This article was published earlier in ThePostOnline