The regional elections were held on 9 June 2024, alongside the Federal and European elections. All of Belgium’s parliaments were able to return majorities, enabling them to form their executives, with the exception of Brussels. This was absolutely unprecedented!
For more than a century, Belgium has been a unitary State, relatively decentralised with its nine provinces and countless municipalities (communes). In the 1950s, centrifugal forces began to develop on the basis of infra-national identities, to the extent that they began to jeopardise the stability of governments. The Flemish called for autonomy in all matters pertaining to culture, language and education, while the Walloons wanted control over the levers of their economy.
In 1970, the Constitution was amended to recognise three linguistic communities (French-, Flemish- and German-speaking) and three regions (Wallonia, Flanders and Brussels). The creation of the communities was relatively straightforward, while the regions took a lot more effort to be brought into being. After various setbacks, the special law of 8 August 1980 was voted through to create the Flemish and Wallonian regions, whilst Brussels was put “on ice”, for want of a political agreement. The Flemish, although very much in the minority in Brussels, argued that the country’s capital should be run on an equal footing by representatives of the two major communities, while the French-speaking Walloons wanted representative democracy, as in the other two regions. The fate of the referral communes located on Flemish soil, but largely French-speaking, were another bone of contention.
The Constitution was flouted for nearly a decade. Various configurations were put forward, including a European district or a ‘free city’. Finally, painstaking negotiations between the Flemish Social Christian Jean-Luc Dehaene and the French-speaking Socialist Philippe Moureaux gave rise to a compromise: the (officially bilingual) Brussels-Capital Region would be limited to 19 communes and governed by a (de facto French-speaking) Minister President and four ministers, two of them Flemish speakers, assisted by three Secretaries of State, one of them a Flemish speaker.
The regional parliament would consist of 89 seats, with 72 MPs to be elected from a list of French speakers and 17 from a Flemish-speaking list (overrepresentation being the price to pay for appeasement). The government would require a majority in both groups. Furthermore, three commune committees would manage all matters that can be personalised. The special law voted through by the national parliament on 12 January 1989 allowed Brussels to elect its MPs for the first time on 18 June of the same year.
Uneventful regional elections were held every five years thereafter. The people of Brussels, whether they spoke French or Flemish, learnt to work together and generate encouraging results. The French-speaking socialists (PS) won every election and were able to choose their allies, until 9 June 2024, when the Liberal Reform Movement (MR) won.
The task of forming a government therefore fell to a member of the MR, namely David Leisterh. As regards the French-speaking group, since the partners of PS in the outgoing coalition (Greens and the Independent Democratic Federalist party, Défi) had collapsed, a coalition between the MR, the Christian Democrats (‘Les Engagés’) and the PS was the natural choice: 44 seats. The results in the Flemish corner, however, were a bit more of a problem. The Greens (GROEN) came first with four seats, followed by a new party, ‘Team Fouad Ahidar’ (3), the far right (Vlaams Belang) (2), the Liberals (Open VLD) (2), the Nieuw-Vlaams Alliantie (NVA) (2), the Socialists (Vooruit) (2), the Christian Democrats (Cd&V)(1) and the far left (PVDA) (1). The potential partners automatically excluded the extremists and the ‘team’.
Within this group of 17 seats, nine constitutes a majority. This would therefore be met in a coalition of GROEN, Open VLD, NVA and Vooruit (total seats: 10). The only problem is that the President of the Brussels branch of PS, Ahmed Laaouej, has for months vetoed the inclusion of the NVA in this possible majority. He argues that the party is incompatible with its values and that it would work to bring the coalition down from within. However, the NVA is the party of the Prime Minister, Bart De Wever. The French-speaking Liberals, represented in the Federal authority, refuse to accept this veto. The matter has been big news in Flanders, where to describe Laaouej as unpopular is something of an understatement. Replacing the NVA with the CD&V would allow for a very small majority, but the Flemish Liberals will have no truck with this if the NVA is excluded.
Contrary to all hopes, the results of the communal elections (October 2024) did nothing to help the situation. On 4 February, in his speech to the authorities constituted, King Philippe welcomed the formation of the Federal government, but added: ‘unfortunately, this is not yet the case in the Region of Brussels, where negotiations are currently at deadlock. Brussels – also our beautiful capital of Europe – is a crossroads, not an impasse. It must not become a symbol of deadlock’ (our translation).
A fortnight later, Leisterh threw in the towel and Laaouej declined the job of forming a government. A pair of MPs acting on their own initiative, from the GROEN and Engagés parties, tried to sell a coalition without the NVA. They were wasting their time. The hypothesis of a minority executive is untenable. The MR then sought to replace the PS with the Greens and Défi, which also led nowhere. Basically, everyone is going around in circles and there is absolutely no sign of any kind of negotiation on the substance.
The press has mocked a political class it describes as immature. The outgoing regional government, still holding the fort, is barely surviving, and only because of the system of provisional twelfths. There is talk of the Region coming under the umbrella of the Federal government, but the Constitution does not permit this. At the most, there could be a de facto tutelage situation if the Region, no longer able to borrow enough money, went cap in hand to the next hierarchical level, which would obviously place political conditions on the arrangement. The Region is already in debt to the tune of more than 14 billion euros and the ratings agencies are getting ready to deliver some bad news.
Many things have already ceased to be: contracts for the staff members in question, funding for social housing, building renovation grants, aid to struggling businesses and the voluntary sector, new investments in hospitals, projects for the Metro, maintaining tunnels, etc. In the month of February alone, more than 200 bankruptcies were reported. Faced with uncertainty, entrepreneurs are biding their time. Unemployment, furthermore, remains high: more than 90,000 people were without a job in March.
Against this sorry backdrop, public security has not improved. There are parts of Brussels that have been taken over by drugs gangs and the Anderlecht shootings sent shock waves that reached far beyond the local population. The Federal Home Affairs Minister has plans to merge police areas across the Region, under the aegis of a chef de corps and a peer-elected bourgmestre, but most of the mayors oppose the project and the police force itself remains sceptical. And to add insult to injury, its reputation as a ‘dirty city’ is consolidated.
The Brussels-Europe liaison office, which is operated by the regional authorities, is struggling to find any encouraging information. The European institutions, it is true, have been going about their own business without any major incidents thus far, but they cannot remain indifferent to the general landscape in which they operate, particularly as they have part-funded a number of urban improvement projects. European Parliament could vote on a resolution on the future of Brussels, but here again, it is unlikely that anything would come of it.
The worsening image of the Capital of Europe also has a cost from that point of view: it is grist to the mill of the detractors of the European Union having a field day on social media.
Renaud Denuit