Belgium
gets new government with Flemish separatist Bart De Wever as PM
After
repeated false starts and breakdowns in talks, the country gets a
Flemish-nationalist led coalition.
January 31,
2025 10:10 pm CET
By Hanne
Cokelaere and Giselle Ruhiyyih Ewing
Five parties
agreed to form a new Belgian coalition government late Friday, concluding
months of negotiations and paving the way for Flemish nationalist Bart De Wever
to serve as the country’s next prime minister.
“After seven
long months, we finally have a government for the country,” said Conner
Rousseau, the president of Vooruit, one of the parties in the new government.
Rousseau referenced the deep divisions the parties’ negotiators had bridged.
“There will be a lot of fake news and a lot of criticism. But many people will
be proud that we’re not afraid to make decisions.”
Negotiators
will still have to seek official approval from their parties to cement the
deal.
Coalition
talks between De Wever’s right-wing New Flemish Alliance (N-VA), the
Francophone center-right Reformist Movement (MR), the Francophone centrist Les
Engagés, the centrist Christian Democrat and Flemish Party and the center-left
Flemish Vooruit party — dubbed the “Arizona” coalition after the colors of the
American state’s flag — hit multiple bumps in the road.
Belgium’s
June election delivered an unexpected result: In the traditionally left-wing
Walloon region in the south of the country, MR emerged the winner. In the
Flanders region in the north, De Wever’s N-VA stayed ahead of the far right. It
led some to hope that it would be easier than ever to bridge Belgium’s language
divides and forge a majority of like-minded parties.
But
negotiations repeatedly collapsed over budget disputes, and Belgian King
Philippe granted De Wever multiple extensions as he sought to reach a coalition
accord. Finally, earlier this month, the king issued De Wever an ultimatum:
form a new government by the end of January or face a new election.
Under
renewed pressure to do a deal, party negotiators entered the final stretch of
talks this Wednesday, racing against the clock to form a new government by
Friday.
Negotiators
finally struck an agreement after marathon talks in the Royal Military Academy,
a stone’s throw from EU institutions on the Schuman square. Initial plans to
meet at the Val Duchesse castle — the scene of several past government deals —
were abandoned when it transpired that the heating and showers were broken.
The new
government will have its work cut out for it, facing a laundry list of tasks
left undone during the prolonged negotiation process. During the extended
interregnum, Belgium missed several critical deadlines including appointing a
European commissioner candidate (which it eventually did) and presenting budget
plans to the European Commission by the end of September (a task that still
languishes).
Flemish
Liberal Prime Minister Alexander De Croo has led a caretaker government in the
months since the June election.
De Wever’s
right-wing nationalist party claims as one of its missions the independence of
Flanders from Belgium, although it’s shifted its approach to one of
“confederalism,” whereby a minimal federal state remains in place but its
regions get most of its powers.
“A Flemish
nationalist who’s moving into Rue de la Loi 16 [the prime minister’s official
seat] — who has to represent Belgium … I’d struggle with that,” Jan Peumans,
formerly the president of the Flemish parliament and a member of De Wever’s
Flemish-nationalist party, told VRT. But, he surmised, maybe “to save Belgium
is also, in part, to save Flanders.”
The
government formation talks have largely been focused on cutting Belgium’s
budget deficit through pension, tax and labor reforms.
But
typically Belgian clashes over the representation of Dutch and French language
groups could still rear their head in the last remaining Belgian region without
a government: Brussels.
Negotiators
in the capital region have cut deals within the two language groups, led by the
center-right MR on the French-speaking side and the Greens on the
Dutch-speaking side, but have not yet cut a deal to govern together. Ahmed
Laaouej, the leader of Brussels’ Francophone Socialist Party, has ruled out a
governing coalition with De Wever’s Flemish-Nationalist Party, and his
suggestions to bypass the usual checks and balances for the representation of
Brussels’ Dutch-speaking minority has riled up the party of Belgium’s brand new
prime minister.
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