| Vlaanderen Boven |
17 januari 2013 09:48 |
Hier is blijkbaar de volledige versie:
Citaat:
Three years ago, I was having lunch in an Italian restaurant with the leader of Belgium's Flemish nationalist party, Bart De Wever. "Give me Elio Di Rupo as prime minister of Belgium and then make Prince Philippe a king," the head of the New Flemish Alliance told me. "Within five years Belgium will be finished. Game over."
At the time I took it as a joke, or perhaps some braggadocio from a man who might have become somewhat detached from reality following the huge success of his party in the 2010 elections.
Three years later, it turns out Mr. De Wever's prediction was anything but a joke. Next year Belgium will see two major elections, and everyone who has been involved in Belgian politics lately knows that chaos is around the corner for this little kingdom.
The latest political crisis started brewing almost as soon as the last one ended. In December 2011, a coalition of Belgian politicians finally formed a government, having gone 541 days without one—a world record for the amount of time between a democratic election and the formation of a government, with Iraq a distant second at 249 days. The Socialist Elio Di Rupo became prime minister, the first time in 37 years that a French-speaking Walloon had occupied this seat. Roughly 60% of Belgium's population is a Dutch-speaking Fleming.
Mr. Di Rupo is a self-made, outspoken homosexual of Italian origin, a man who grew up in a single-parent family in abject poverty. His hard upbringing has made him very popular with Walloons—his resistance to Flemish demands for more autonomy even more so.
The flip side is that Mr. Di Rupo remains totally disconnected from Flemish reality and appears utterly incapable of learning Dutch. This makes it difficult if not impossible for him to explain and sell his government's policies in the northern part of his country, and forces him to rely on his deputies when he wants to speak to Flemish constituents. Mainly because of his inability to communicate, public opinion in Flanders is that Mr. Di Rupo has effectively failed as prime minister.
The language-based public-opinion gap is continuing to widen and is now compounded by Belgium's socioeconomic divides, which also splits along north-south lines. Put simply, Flanders votes largely for conservative parties, while in Wallonia and Brussels, the Socialist Party has traditionally been dominant. This makes every decision and every new measure subject to endless discussion.
Traditionally Walloons and Flemings have managed to get by with uneasy compromises and coalitions. But it's hard to see how these arrangements can survive. The divisions are growing deeper, and political leaders of the younger generation are eager to move forward with their agendas—even if it means Flanders and Wallonia taking different paths.
This brings us to the question of Belgium's king, who still has important political powers in the constitutional monarchy. With political crises always around the corner, the Belgian king—Albert II at the moment—is occasionally called upon to influence one side or the other.
But never before has the king of Belgium had to deal with outspoken nationalists calling for a republic. The Flemish nationalists do not respect traditional codes and are not interested in the monarchy or the Belgian unity it represents. King Albert II, of course, did nothing to endear himself to them in his Christmas speech, in which he made a thinly veiled comparison between Flemish separatists and prewar fascists.
Meanwhile, the Walloons—who in the past have seen the monarchy as a crucial guarantor of Belgian unity—are increasingly skeptical that King Albert II's son, Crown Prince Philippe, will be able to carry on his father's role. Under the leadership of a shyer, more reticent King Philippe, Walloons fear that Belgium's difficult balance would be allowed to fall apart. To make matter worse, Queen Fabiola, Belgium's once-beloved dowager queen, has recently been accused of setting up a foundation through which to (legally) avoid Belgium's death tax.
That leaves the monarchy in no position to help bolster Belgium's increasingly ragged polity. If Belgium retains its monarchy at all, it may eventually become one with no political power, like Sweden's.
At least the Belgian national football team is doing well at the moment. Maybe they could win all their matches on the road to the World Cup in Brazil in 2014. That might bring a little fresh air and Flemish-Walloon friendship back to Belgium, but it would be unlikely to last long.
|
|
