In memoriam Willem Witteveen (1952-2014)
The reactions on the sudden death of professor Willem Witteveen are of grief and shock. “RIP Willem Witteveen… In my days, you were one of the most inspiring teachers at the Faculty of Law. To end in such a tragic way, somewhere in Ukrain”, a former student writes on Facebook. “Good stories, smart man”, someone else says. Together with his wife Lidwien Heerkens and his daughter Marit, Witteveen was one of the passengers of flight MH17 from Malaysia Airlines.
Both Witteveens wife and daughter were also closely connected to our university. Lidwien Heerkens used to work at the Tilburg School of Humanities (TSH); Marit Witteveen was a second-year student Liberal Arts.
Apart from being an appreciated law philosopher and politician, Witteveen was a Sufi, an odd combination. “Sufism is a spiritual attitude that helps to freely approach your limitations; it recognizes the mystic core of all world religions”, the website of the Dutch Sufi Movement tells us. The members will commemorate Witteveen in a special service.
Willem Witteveen was connected to Tilburg University as a professor since 1990. He worked in several functions: founding dean of Liberal Arts and Sciences, Head of Department and member of many commissions on faculty and university level. He published articles on law, rhetoric and political theory regularly, taught rhetoric and was a enthousiastic debate leader.
Independent and inspired
The board of the university reacted: “Willem Witteveen was a true academic, he was solidary, a colleague in the true sense of the word.” Diederik Samsom, leader of the PvdA, Witteveens political party, praised him as one of the most friendly colleagues. “Willem has contributed immensely to the course of the party. In him, we lose a driven and professional politician.” Witteveen kept his autonomous attitude while he worked in political The Hague. In the late nineties, he wrote a new principle program for the PvdA, that the party didn’t dare to put into action. His headstrong voting behavior caused him to have to quit before the end of his first term as a senator. In January 2013 he returned.
Witteveen found that the balance between sense of security and legislative pressure was threatened. He was a fierce opponent of certain trends: offenses that were covered by parquet employees instead of independent judges, inmates that had to pay for their own detention. Witteveen concluded: “Safety comes before law and money comes before justice.”
It is sour that a man who so highly prioritized justice and the law probably became victim of a rocket attack by self-appointed Russian cowboys. Witteveens good friend Folkert Jensma also finds it hard to contain. He writes in NRC: “How can such a gentle, intelligent, intensely humane and balanced person get hit by an air missile?” It is possible in our world. Maybe, Witteveen himself realized this all too well.
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