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Henny De Baets, the administrator-general of OVAM, is committed to an investigation in the 3M-Oosterweel file with full knowledge of the facts. She distributed a statement Saturday evening through her lawyer.
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‘In this debate, which is essential for citizens, there is no room for fragmentary information, nor for injudicious suspicions that could threaten a thorough investigation by the Flemish Parliament.’ That is what Henny De Baets, the top woman of the Public Waste Agency of Flanders (OVAM) said on Saturday evening in a statement that was distributed through her lawyer, the Belga news agency reports.
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The 3M Oosterweel file is a complex and multidisciplinary file. Society is entitled to the truth and to a complete file, according to De Baets. ‘I deeply regret that there is no serene dialogue possible today and that one false suspicion after another tendentious insinuation is being spread. Depending on who can benefit from it, there is daily, partial or colored leakage, not to inform the citizen, but to score on someone else’s hood. I am not participating in this, my substantive communication always went to my minister, as it should be’, it reads.
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‘I deeply regret that there is no serene dialogue possible today and that one false suspicion after another tendentious insinuation is being spread. ‘
Henny De Baets
Top woman OVAM
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No warning communication
De Baets responds, among other things, to the failure to distribute warning communication in the past about the PFOS pollution in Zwijndrecht. ‘My employees and I complied with the ministerial decision at the time that OVAM will not take any initiative regarding communication or be involved in it because Lantis (then BAM) has sufficient experience with (resident) communication. That was not my decision, nor was that of my collaborators who worked on this file.’
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‘In the light of the state of the art and the science of today, the work of the past is now being reassessed. This is unfair and intellectually dishonest. (…) The justified social concern about health and safety apparently lends itself to far-reaching political entanglements. There are also personal attacks, including on me. I am not a politician, but I am a civil servant with an impeccable career, serving society and the successive ministers I have served for decades’.
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‘In the light of the state of the art and of today’s science, the work of the past is now being reassessed. This is unfair and intellectually unfair.’
Henny De Baets
Top woman OVAM
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‘It is my task to ensure that during the parliamentary investigation citizens and political authorities obtain answers to their questions directly from OVAM, rather than through incomplete, directed, opportunistic or even deliberately incorrect press leaks.’
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‘All that I know and all that my organization provides me, I provide with complete transparency and loyalty to Minister Demir and to the inquiry committee of the Flemish Parliament. I am furthermore confident that I will learn about my performance through Minister Demir and not through anonymous government sources in the media,” the statement concludes.
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