Belgian Politics & Elections: Federal, regional & EP elections on June 9, 2024

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Jean-Marie DeDecker (right-wing populist / libertarian) will be the new mayor of Middelkerke... I must say i'm quite happy for him. He had a rough political career, and was basically almost politically burnt, but he will finally have a mandate after all those years in opposition.

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How does the mayor thing work? The biggest party gets the mayor, or do they have to form coalitions? In the latter case, how does someone like Dedecker or, even more extreme, the VB person in Ninove become mayor?

Jean-Marie DeDecker (right-wing populist / libertarian) will be the new mayor of Middelkerke... I must say i'm quite happy for him. He had a rough political career, and was basically almost politically burnt, but he will finally have a mandate after all those years in opposition.

I think you must be the only PVDA voter who approves of Kurz and is happy for JMDD

DeDecker has an absolute majority.

I like it when there is a fresh breathe of air through something. I don't like it when parties or politicians stay too long in power. That's why i disapprove s.pa / PS mostly (party of power, party that declines, lost touch with the people and are involved in many corruption scandals). PVDA-PTB is a new challenger on the left with fresh ideas that i like, and i'm a democratic socialist (similar to Bernie Sanders, Jeremy Corbyn's movements...) but i don't participate in the "let's all bash the right" part of the left (and vice versa, because the right does the same as well).

If the right can do something good, you just have to tell it that they can do their job on this and this. In a democracy, you'll have to work together with other political parties, and that's sometimes with parties that can be vastly different when it comes to policies. Especially locally, this is something that is possible. DeDecker won in a city that basically doesn't have a strong left-wing base, so it was either going to be him or a different centre-right liberal or christian democrat who were in power in the last 6 years and didn't do well. Dedecker knows what to do, and will bring the necessary change. He is also a honest (way too honest) person, very direct and the man you have to vote for if you want direct democracy which is important to me (direct elections, being more in touch with people, etcetera...).

Kurz does the same and might be "kind of a populist" in some way, but at least, what i admire about his approach is that the OVP learns about their mistakes and change their policies, in order to prevent the FPO from rising to absolute power. You'll have politicians who ignore trends and eventually lead their political party into ashes (literally). I mean, i would vote for a different political party if i was Austrian, but i have no reason to disapprove him (that might still come) yet. Kurz isn't ignorant to the problems / issues Europe faces, and that's something you clearly see with a lot of western politicians.

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How does the mayor thing work? The biggest party gets the mayor, or do they have to form coalitions? In the latter case, how does someone like Dedecker or, even more extreme, the VB person in Ninove become mayor?

They do form coallitions mostly. The biggest party doesn't get automatically the mayor unless they have an absolute majority. In Ninove it's uncertain whether the far-right will continue to serve the mayor or not.

In my city, it went between the CD&V (christian democrats) and the OVLD (liberals), and the CD&V is expected to be the biggest and also has the current incumbent, but there has been talks / rumours between a coalition between OVLD, N-VA and s.pa. Of course, i really don't think this is democratic, and i support the incumbent right now which has done a good job for the most part (but not all). We also have the Greens (who have a popular candidate), the far-right (which were invisible in the campaign) and the far-left which i've voted for.

The first results show that the pre-agreement might fail because they lack one seat to form a coalition, mostly because a lot of N-VA voters voted for VB (N-VA lost heavily here, VB won heavily), but ironically the high amount of VB voters here might save the current incumbent (CD&V). My political party has 3,6% of the vote, not enough for a seat, but a remarkable good result and the best result in my province, and probably even the 5th best result of West & East Flanders combined (after Sint-Niklaas, Zelzate, Ronse and Ghent). Ronse is my birth city as well, hope they'll have a seat there. They have one in Sint-Niklaas (which was close). Green fails to have third seats, which was their ambition here.

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The results in the cities seems to be very disappointing for the left. It's still early, but in Ghent, the liberals come surprisingly very close. s.pa-groen loses heavily. The results in Ghent are very good for PVDA however.

In Antwerp: Greens don't win as much as expected, and nationalists stay on par with their result in 2012 which was not expected as well. Current coalition might just continue.

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VB does really well also in Denderleeuw.

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The PS of Molenbeek didn't exclude a coalition with the PTB.

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Liberals declare victory, and they already say: Ghent will have their first liberal mayor in 60 years. Kind of surprising. Problem is only 70% is counted, and it's currently close. They might not have enough seats (if they lose one seat, it's not possible to have a centre-right coalition).

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I think sums it well. The media calls it a pyrrhic victory for the Greens in Flanders, especially in Antwerp. I've seen some remarkable reactions. The candidate for the Greens want to be in the coalition (but it's not possible without N-VA or VB), and they don't want to govern with N-VA. The chairman of the s.pa might have to step down as a political analyst have said.

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The PS of Molenbeek didn't exclude a coalition with the PTB.

If Molenbeek PTB have any brains at all they'll stay the hell away.

I agree. I would also reject such a thing.

In Ghent, it seems like the centre-right coalition won't have enough after all... The liberals are now celebrating that they'll serve the next mayor. The candidate of the liberals has said: Ghent will have a liberal mayor after 60 years. I currently don't see it, how they could do that. It's currently very close though... They're still counting there, and it will be close until the last vote comes in. Who the next mayor will be might be decided by one vote there.

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Would it be possible to have VB vote for the liberal candidate and to carry on with a minority government, or would it be seen as a violation of the cordon sanitaire? I imagine that this would be especially controversial in Gent of all places...

No not possible. That would hurt the standings of those political parties on the long run, and cause the left to win back again in 2024 and possibly also nationally next year, because Ghent is one of the most watched elections. The CD&V is also centre-left in Ghent and i don't think DeClercq would even accept such a thing, but coalition talks might be difficult. I imagine after his speech this evening a coalition between s.pa-Groen and Open VLD would hurt Open VLD Ghent. Although when he doesn't make it, he will most likely just step down and retire from local politics. It's very close, but the result is very important as it might decide his political future. It could be dependant on just a few votes.

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They now lack two seats to form a coalition. The liberal candidate might regret that speech he made a few hours ago.

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Apparently, insiders have said that the cartel in Ghent will break. Greens will probably leave the cartel, and get in a coalition with CD&V and Open VLD. This is why DeClercq was so overly confident that Ghent would get a liberal mayor.

EDIT: Others have said that because he had most preference votes, the current coalition will continue but with DeClercq as mayor because he has most preference votes, and because socialists know they currently lack a strong person to lead the city / country.

VLD can even get in a coalition with only the Greens in Ghent, cause from the cartel, the Greens have 14 seats and s.pa 7 seats. This of course explains a lot more. After all it doesn't seem like the greens weren't that loyal.

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Results for PVDA-PTB:



city - number of seats - percentage of vote

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Why did the PVDA perform so well in Zelzate?

They always do. It's a traditional stronghold of them. It's an industrial city where the PVDA has a strong local base. They're being called "the doctors". It has some working-class quarters (like Little Russia) and it also houses a metal company Arcelor Mittal.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4dQz1Rn6SlM

This was in a period when they were more radical and the first time they've won 20% of the vote was in 2006. They've repeated those results in 2012 and in 2018. Many people are also angry with the current ruling parties here, and have said the PVDA is a genuine party, and has some good proposals. The party could even convince some rich people in businessman i've read in an article before. If anything, the result was a bit disappointing, because i thought the PVDA could grow a bit there. But there are coalition talks right now between s.pa and PVDA there, because s.pa (the big winner) has said they want to drop the current incumbent and his party + PVDA have enough seats to form a coalition together.

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Also, the satirical joke party Pokémon List has done really well in the provincial council elections. It performed much better than the immigrant parties (VMC and MRP) in this provincial district (which includes Ghent), and the joke party could convince 6834 voters.

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https://www.vrt.be/vrtnws/en/2018/10/16/nationalists-will-not-be-entering-into-coalition-talks-with-forz/

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There has been controversies among several alleged nazi-greets during the victory celebration and among racist posts being made on facebook several years ago.

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https://www.vrt.be/vrtnws/en/2018/10/16/nationalists-will-not-be-entering-into-coalition-talks-with-forz/

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There has been controversies among several alleged nazi-greets during the victory celebration and among racist posts being made on facebook several years ago.

-it was not nazi-greets.

https://www.7sur7.be/7s7/fr/1502/Belgique/article/detail/3486844/2018/10/16/Non-le-Vlaams-Belang-n-a-pas-fete-sa-victoire-par-un-salut-nazi.dhtml

-to be honest, I don't understand the chocomousse-post facebook.

It's important to note that NVA will not support an anti-Vlaams belang coalitie in Ninove. But wihtout NVA support, no majority for anyone. So imbroglio...

That's a personal opinion. I wasn't there, so i can't confirm it, but i'm just repeating what the media said. Of course the right will always tell that the media is left-wing and fake. The nationalist chairman have at least strongly condemned the photo (and said it was disgusting). I don't understand the joke, because i don't see the fun in it. Might things be overblown, possibly.

The media is biased towards us as well. We're never invited on debates or talkshows. We're being silenced. The media frames things differently. When we do something good, they don't mention it. They organize a smear campaign against the far-right, and they silence us. You know, i bet more than 50% of Flemish people have never heard about the PVDA-PTB. It's that bad. Check the Flanders News website, and check the coverage about the election. Other (international & independent) media have said we're one of the winners of the elections or even "the winner", but we're not mentioned on their website, when they talk about the Brussels or the Flemish elections. They just talk about the Green successes or how the N-VA has failed to make a breakthrough in Brussels, but that the PVDA-PTB won 10% and went to 10-15% on average in Brussels, is of course not important enough or doesn't fit the agenda of the media in which they prefer to focus on the Green successes.

proof:
https://www.vrt.be/vrtnws/en/2018/10/15/so-who-won-the-election/
https://www.vrt.be/vrtnws/en/2018/10/14/greens-advance-across-the-brussels-region/#/10/1/21004/percentages

Ask a /belgium reddit-er, who won the elections, and they'll say far-left, greens and far-right.

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https://www.vrt.be/vrtnws/en/2018/10/10/vrt-probe-reveals-true-face-of-rightist-organisation/

The S&V scandal with english subtitles.

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It did surprise me though that groups like S&V didn't lose popularity, and seemed to have even increased their popularity, probably mostly among VB and Theo Francken supporters. There might have been some framing in the PANO documentary, i give you that, but the S&V video's were also highly framed. I mean it's a case of the pot calling the kettle black. Their meeting with Orban, their action on the Gravensteen and their video's explaining the VRT framing were all framed as well. I'm not surprised about the memes (who were not made by them, but just shared, even though DVL claims he didn't made the memes, but that's not the point, the memes were shared in their group"). But what did frighten me were their plans of infriltating key organizations (their so-called "long march through the instutions"), body cult, glorifying nazism & sexism, posing with guns that shocked me. Yes, they've made the mistake by opening such a group to 200 people (esp. with such sensitive content), but it's just pretty disgusting, and it shows us how dangerous men like these are, especially DVL.

I agree that lots of private political chat groups will contain content that will be embarassing, but i doubt it would be this extreme. But it's a reminder that people will need to be a bit more careful with what they post online. Decades ago, people could just tell controversial or racist stuff against each other, but when you place it online today, you'll be crucified. It's similar to how teenagers might be confronted with nudist photo's they've made off theirselves and post on snapchat or message to people and than regret about it (that used to be different, times "change"). But there is still a difference between one or some racist comments and the 60.000 racist memes (incl. some neo-nazist memes) they've found online, and i doubt VRT would lie about that number. I'm not sure whether the approach of the VRT wasn't the right one, and there was definitely a political agenda behind it, but they've called it on theirselves and it's pretty naive and stupid handling of S&V that caused them to get publically crucified. I can understand more moderate right-wingers or N-VA supporters to be angry about this, or that the VRT would be called very biased about this. I mean terms like "fake media" are getting more & more popular, and while there is a political strategy behind it ("illegitamizing their claims and content by repeating it as often"), they've a point that some media isn't neutral, very biased and a danger to us, but it would be pretty naive to think that the same doesn't apply to other media like FOX that might be more approving of their politics. The best approach might be the middle-on-the-road one on this, but it isn't a clear and easy ethical issue to deal with. It definitely has worsened over the last 20 years as well. I might give you an example: a tv-series like Friends or (a Belgian example) F.C. De Kampioenen wouldn't been possible anymore because the content of it would be too sexist for current-era norms. I'm a bit torn between "the big brother is watching you"-society and "it's shocking that there are still people who basically want to resurrect nazism from the ashes and have so much success with it because they have political talent". They both frighten me a lot.

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I think there is a lot of difference between "nationalists" in general and S&V. I also disagree with the "whataboutism" of the right-wing. What S&V did is wrong. I'm quite sure they didn't plan terrorist attacks, but the core of that group was at least radicalized, DVL is a dangerous demagogue who isn't the person as he project to the outside world he is. I don't think we should minimize (or even legitimate) the danger of people who like to be as edgy as it could get. They said theirselves they wanted to do meta-politics, infriltrating in key organizations or moderate right-wing movements in order to shift the public opinion to the right and create an environment where populist demagogues like DVL would thrive in. It's been said black-on-white on those private chat groups by them. But they got caught, and it unveiled a danger that is still present today (or even more now than before), because there has been a clear rise by populist movements (like Trump), identitarian groups. Of course, partly because the establishment have failed to provide the people what they need, and are ignorant to some problems we face right now.

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Ecolo also has said "no" to a progressive coalition in Molenbeek, saying that's it wasn't up to them to join a coalition. I think it was a good move from both PTB and Ecolo to not enter coalition. The Grand Coalition between MR and PS won't make them popular as they were each other's rivals in Molenbeek and campaigned with: "vote for us if you don't want the other one in office", and now they end up with both being in office.

It tells you a lot about PS if you know that the much weaker PVDA in Flanders is capable of governing in Zelzate and Borgerhout with s.pa (and in Borgerhout also Groen), but if coalitions with PS doesn't turn out to work in Wallonia. The PS is often so big that they actually don't need PTB and they use the PTB the same way N-VA uses the Vlaams Belang to prove that a vote for the extremes is a vote thrown away.

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The far-left get into power in the Flemish commune of Zelzate.

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Looks like sp.a are continuing on their slow path to utter irrelevance by entering a potential coalition with N-VA in Antwerp.

I don't understand why they are doing this. They don't seem to get it. It won't be long before we don't even have a social democratic party anymore.

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https://www.vrt.be/vrtnws/en/2018/12/03/compact-on-migration-stormy-weather-for-belgian-cabinet/

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It's possible that the government might fall over this topic, and call snap elections (we have elections in may however already).

Other news:
65,000 take part in Belgium’s biggest ever climate demonstration

"Hi-Viz" protesters pelt police with fire bombs, many Walloon fuel depots remain closed

82 people detained after Friday’s rioting during the Brussels Hi-Viz demonstration

There is a saying that goes as following: When it thunders in Paris, it rains in Brussels, and this is what we see that the French protests have spread towards French-speaking Belgium and Brussels regions, with smaller protests in the North. There have been riots in Brussels and Charleroi as well last week.

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Could the UN Migration Pact cause the Belgian Government to fall?

Tension has continued to mount between the parties that form Belgium’s Federal Government. The bone of contention is the UN Migration Pact that is due to be signed in the Moroccan city of Marrakesh next Monday. The Flemish nationalists are vigorously opposed to the pact, while the three other parties that make up the federal coalition (the Flemish and Francophone liberals and the Flemish Christian democrats) are in favour of Belgian signing up to the pact.

The tension has been ignited still further as the Flemish nationalists launched a campaign against the migration pact on social media (see below).



Experts nominated by parties from both the coalition and the opposition gave their interpretation of what signing up to the Migration Pact would mean before a special meeting of the Federal Parliament’s Foreign Affairs Select Committee on Tuesday. The diplomat Jean-Luc Bodson (photo below) who had represented Belgium at the negotiations for the UN Migration Pact also addressed the Select Committee. Mr Bodson said that “everything that Belgium had asked for had been included in the Pact”.     


However, some legal experts fear that “activists” among their colleagues could use the Migration Pact as a weapon to initiate long-drawn out legal proceedings to obtain leave to remain in Belgium for people that under the present rules would be denied it. This view is backed by the largest party in the federal coalition, the Flemish nationalist. The party launched a campaign against the pact on social media. The campaign was criticised by both the opposition and the nationalists’ partners in the Federal Government.     

The party fears that if Belgium signs up to the Migration pact illegal immigration would no longer be able to be sanctioned and that every immigrant would be given automatic access to social security and other provision from day 1.  Furthermore, the party believes that passages in the Pact that state that migrants should be allowed to retain their own culture would undermine efforts to integrate them into Flemish/Belgian society. The nationalists also refuse to accept country-specific side notes being added to allay some of their fears as they believe than in practice they wouldn’t be worth the paper they’re written on.


Opinion is also divided on whether or not the Migration Pact would be legally binding.  The Flemish Christian democrats slammed the nationalists‘ social media campaign saying that you can’t on the one hand sit at the negotiating while at the same time be campaigning against the very thing you are negotiating about.  The Flemish greens called on the nationalists to end their campaign of hate.

At around 4pm the nationalists withdrew their campaign advertisements from social media.

Meanwhile, the Flemish liberals have suggested that the Federal Parliament could approve the Migration Pact with an alternative majority made up of MPs from parties from the coalition (but without the Flemish nationalists) and the opposition.

However, the question on everyone’s lips is whether a compromise can still be found between the four coalition parties. A cabinet meeting has already been postponed to allow the Prime Minister Charles Michel time to continue bilateral talks with the coalition parties.