Dutch protesters call for removal of colonial statue
June 20, 2020
Police in the Netherlands have broken up rival protests at the statue of a Dutch East India Company officer. Colonial-era figures have become focal points of anti-racism protests around Europe in recent weeks.
Image: picture-alliance/ANP/R. Utrecht
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Some 500 protesters on Friday gathered in the town of Hoorn, north of Amsterdam, to call for the removal of a statue of 17th century colonial-era Dutch officer Jan Pieterszoon Coen.
There was also a smaller group of counterprotests. When demonstrators refused to disperse, police broke up the crowds with shields and batons, arresting five people. No injuries or damages were reported.
Coen, an officer in the Dutch East India trading company, led a conquest of the Banda islands in 1621, in modern-day Indonesia. Only 1,000 of the 15,000 local inhabitants were believed to have survived.
''Everyone here today gives a voice to the victims. A mass murderer does not deserve a statue,'' said Romy Rondeltap, one of the protest organizers.
Toppled monuments: A selection of controversial figures
Global anti-racism protests following the killing of George Floyd fuel the controversy over the interpretation of the colonial and Confederate eras. In Europe and the US, monuments are damaged, razed and removed.
Image: picture-alliance/NurPhoto/G. Spadafora
Edward Colston: slave trader and philanthropist
Controversy over the statue of Edward Colston in Bristol was rife for years. On June 7, demonstrators removed the bronze from its pedestal and tossed it into the water. While Colston was working for the Royal African Society, an estimated 84,000 Africans were transported for enslavement; 19,000 of them died along the way. But he went down in history as a benefactor for his donations to charities.
Image: picture-alliance/NurPhoto/G. Spadafora
Robert Baden-Powell: initiator of the Boy Scouts
Activists accuse Robert Baden-Powell, the man who initiated the Boy Scout movement, of racism, homophobia and admiration for Adolf Hitler. His statue stood on Brownsea Island in southern England. Amid the current wave of monuments being toppled by protesters, local authorities have now removed Baden-Powell's statue as a precaution.
Image: picture-alliance/dpa/A. Matthews
Leopold II: Belgian colonial-era monarch
Belgium has quite a few statues of King Leopold II. The monarch ruled the country from 1865 to 1909 and established a brutal colonial regime in Congo that is in fact considered one of the most violent in history. Protesters smeared several statues of Leopold II with paint. Authorities removed the above statue from its pedestal in the Antwerp suburb of Ekeren and sent it to a museum depot.
Image: Reuters/ATV
Christopher Columbus: revered and scorned
In the US, too, disputes have flared over monuments dedicated to controversial historical figures. Among others, protesters have targeted Christopher Columbus. A statue in Boston was beheaded (photo). North American indigenous groups reject the worship of Columbus because his expeditions enabled the colonization of the continent and the genocide of its autochthonous population in the first place.
Image: Reuters/B. Snyder
Columbus in Latin America: a different point of view
Some people see Columbus as one of the most important figures in world history, but for many people in Latin America the explorer's name stands for the beginning of a painful era. From the perspective of the indigenous population, Spanish colonialism is a dark chapter in their history. In Latin America, too, statues of Columbus have been destroyed or damaged in the past.
Image: picture-alliance/dpa/B. Boensch
Jefferson Davis: Civil War president
Jefferson Davis was President of the Confederate States of America, one of the leaders in the country's mid 19th-century Civil War. Protesters toppled and spray-painted the Confederate president's statue in Richmond, Virginia. House speaker Nancy Pelosi urged the removal of Confederate statues from the US Capitol because they were monuments to men "who advocated cruelty and barbarism."
Image: Getty Images/C. Somodevilla
Robert E. Lee: a divisive figure
Another Confederate statue in Richmond, this one a monument to General Robert E. Lee, is to be removed in the next few days. Governor Ralph Northam has given orders to take down the monument. Many African Americans regards the statues of Confederate politicians and soldiers as symbols of oppression and slavery.
Image: picture-alliance/AP Photo/S. Helber
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In the wake of the police killing of George Floyd in the US that has fueled the Black Lives Matter movement around the globe, the Netherlands in recent weeks has seen protests across the country against police violence and racism, including two large gatherings in the capital, Amsterdam. These protests have been driven by concerns over racism on the part of police and tax authorities, and discrimination in schools, workplaces and the housing market.
Statues of colonial-era Europeans have become focal points of many anti-racism protests on the continent, including in the UK and Belgium. Last week, a statue of Dutch colonial mariner Piet Hein was smeared with the word "killer."
While many people view Coen and other colonial-era figures as brutal oppressors, they have also drawn support from those who associate them with Dutch history and identity.