New education minister from BBB controversial over X posts about rainbow crossing

The new minister of Education will be Gouke Moes, a deputy in the Provincial Council of Groningen. BBB announced this on Monday evening. Moes came under scrutiny over X posts about a defaced rainbow crossing.

After the departure of Eppo Bruins and other officeholders from NSC, the two remaining governing parties, VVD and BBB, had to find successors. For the ministry of Education, Culture and Science that will be the 33-year-old Gouke Moes.

'Enormous honour'

Moes has been a deputy in the Provincial Council of Groningen since March. He previously worked as a blacksmith and machine tool operator. He moved into education and taught English, technology, physics and chemistry. He was also a teacher of PIE (production, installation and energy).

He became politically active for BBB in 2021 and in 2023 he entered the Provincial Council of Groningen, where he became group leader. A few months ago he became a provincial deputy. He is now moving to The Hague to become caretaker minister of Education, Culture and Science.

Moes calls it an enormous honour ‘that I may use this role for our education, our culture and the sciences’, he says in a statement from BBB. “My heart is in education, I have taught in the classroom myself for years, and I am very much looking forward to getting started.”

Rainbow crossing

A year ago Moes tweeted about a rainbow crossing that had been daubed with swastikas: “This is how polarisation works. A pity, a pity on both sides.”

When someone on X asked which two sides he meant, he replied: “The side that decided such a rainbow crossing should be placed there and thereby completely ignores (perhaps even provokes) the lived experience of many young people there and the side that then responds with swastikas.”

It outraged many. “His message came across to us as equating the symbol of equality, the rainbow, with a symbol of hate, the swastika”, the provincial parties of GroenLinks, CDA, Socialist Party, Party for the Animals, Volt, PvdA, Party for the North and D66 wrote in a joint statement. “We are shocked by this message and distance ourselves from it.”

Understanding

Moes himself denied comparing the rainbow symbol to the swastika. “What I do say, though, is that if you want to move beyond polarisation, you must try to understand other people. I just wondered whether this is the best way to counter polarisation, or the best way to advance the LGBTIAQ+ movement. And I think it’s sad that people are so far apart that something like this can happen.”

GroenLinks-PvdA MP Lisa Westerveld has already announced that she will submit parliamentary questions following Moes’s nomination as minister. For the record, State Secretary Mariëlle Paul is responsible for emancipation policy.