However, according to the Dutch National Broadcasting Corporation (NOS), the female KOL Tjarda will be busier in the near future because she has just been elected as the head of the town of Leiderdorp. This town of 27,000 people is located on the outskirts of Leiden, between The Hague and the capital Amsterdam. Before taking office in November, Tjarda was a member of the Zeist City Council and a member of Prime Minister Mark Rutte's People's Party for Freedom and Democracy (VVD).

Elected mayor of Leiderdorp, Tjarda is committed to promoting inclusivity and accessibility to young people. On her TikTok page, Tjarda stresses: “Why can’t a blind person be a KOL, vlog, speak in public and represent a force in political society? I think all of this is possible. And that’s what I do, to inspire and motivate people everywhere, all the time.”

Blind female KOL Tjarda Struik will be the head of the town of Leiderdorp from next November. Photo: Slate.fr

Hugo Langenberg, head of the Leiderdorp Mayoral Appointment Committee, stressed that KOL Tjarda’s presence on TikTok is a big advantage. “The current mayor of Leiderdorp does not use social media and she is 70 years old. Tjarda is younger and her use of social media to reach a large number of people, including many young people, is an advantage. She is definitely doing a good job,” Hugo stressed.

This is not the first time that a blind person has held an important position in the Dutch administration. The first blind person was elected mayor in the Netherlands in 1981. In 2022, another blind person was elected mayor of a municipality in the south of the Netherlands. In other countries, blind people have also held important political positions, such as Mr. David Paterson, former Governor of New York (USA) from 2008 to 2010; French MP José Beaurai; or Jacques Payard, the head of the small town of Lioux-les-Monges in Creuse, France since 2014.

PHUONG LINH