Basta (TV show)

Basta was a Flemish television show aired in January and February 2011 on the Belgian channel Eén. The show was hosted by Neveneffecten and produced by Woestijnvis.

It was a mix between comedy, current affairs and crime. The show tried to give some of one's own medicine.

Although the show was a blockbuster, a second season was not made as Neveneffecten though their approach would most probably not work anymore as they became famous.

In 2008 many Belgian banks got money from the government due to a bank crisis. This was however paid with tax money. Basta contacted all those banks and requested if they could recharge their money, which was estimated at 250 euros for each Belgian inhabitant. No bank did pay them, so Basta decided to take another approach: they stole staplers, hole punchers etc. from the desks.

Later, Basta founded a new bank: Fides Bank with a limited amount of money (only €150). Although there was a bank crisis, partially caused by mismanagement, many CEO's of those banks still got huge royalties. In same concept, Fides Bank paid their CEO's a royalty of €150 and went bankrupt. As they were a bank, they also requested the Belgian government to give 20 billion euros to save the company. Their request was ignored and classified.

In June 2010 Woestijnvis was charged as they sent fake news items to the press. Woestijnvis did acknowledge this, but also told it was meant as part of a new show. It was the intention of Basta to verify if the media did check news items on trustworthy or not. Basta succeeded partially as some of their fake news items were indeed published by several media, but they were unmasked.

Residents complain about the helpdesk of many telecom operators. There are long wait times, repetitive questions, unwanted inquiries, different menus and submenus, calls just hung up by the agent, many transfers.

Basta placed a container in front of the main entrance of Mobistar Evere and painted a telephone number on it. Furthermore, they created a calldesk with a similar setup as used at Mobistar. One of the security agents of Mobistar called the number with the request to move the container. Basta used same techniques as Mobistar such as long waiting times, different agents who always ask same questions, long menus etc. After many calls by the security agent, Basta removed the container a few hours later.

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Wikipedia