Belgium: suspension of reform talks - full text
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Tensions between the Flemish- and French-speaking political parties escalated in December following the refusal of a Flemish minister to ratify the election of French-speaking mayors in the Flemish (Dutch)-speaking region of Flanders on Nov. 27.
On Dec. 19, the government offered its resignation following an unrelated scandal over the bailout of the Fortis financial services company.
Immediate context
After only four months in office, Belgian Prime Minister Yves Leterme had in July tendered his resignation to King Albert II, saying that he had failed to resolve differences over constitutional reform between the French- and Flemish-speaking parties of his five-party coalition government.
Belgium's Dutch-speaking northern region of Flanders demanded greater autonomy, while the French-speaking southern region of Wallonia remained firmly opposed to any further devolution of powers to the regions. Leterme said that the views of the different parties were "irreconcilable".
King Albert asked Leterme's government to stay on in a caretaker capacity and appointed three senior regional politicians to seek a solution to the crisis. These were French-speaking leaders Francois-Xavier de Donnea from Brussels and Raymond Langendries from the Walloon region, and Karl-Heinz Lambertz, a leading representative of the small German-speaking community.
In a further initiative, the Flanders regional government in September announced that it was prepared to enter into dialogue with French-speaking representatives from Wallonia, and politicians from the bilingual Brussels region, in an attempt to resolve the deadlock.
Reaction and outlook
The inability of Belgium's politicians to agree on constitutional reform stoked fears that the country was on the brink of breaking apart. Until recent times, Belgium had enjoyed a long tradition of consensus and compromise but analysts blamed right-wing inflitration into mainstream Flemish parties for exacerbating the issue of regional autonomy. Separatist tendencies had only recently come to the fore.
Critics accused some political parties of operating only for the benefit of their regions rather than for the good of Belgium. Those opposed to further regional devolution argued that any greater extension of regional autonomy would render Belgium's central government superfluous.
There was speculation that the proposed devolution of power to the regions would make Flemish secession inevitable. Flemish secessionists cited as their model the dissolution of the federation of Czechoslovakia in 1992, when Slovak nationalist claims for more autonomy led to a "velvet divorce" and Czecholsovakia split into two sovereign states.
Despite Flemish demands for greater autonomy, opinion polls showed that the majority of Belgians were opposed to the division of the country. When talks between the French- and Flemish-speaking parties remained deadlocked in November 2007, an estimated 35,000 French- and Flemish-speaking protesters marched through Brussels (the capital) to demand that the parties avert the breakup of Belgium.
Historical context
The Celtic tribe, the Belgae, occupied the geographical area that is now Belgium from 600 BC. Between 57 and 50 BC, the area became part of the Roman Empire as the Roman province of Belgica. From 375 AD, the Germanic tribe of the Franks invaded Belgica, occupying the northern part of the province, which became overwhelmingly Germanic. The southern part remained Roman. In 1384 Belgium came under the rule of the Dukes of Burgundy, a family related to the kings of France, then passed (through marriage) into the possession of the Hapsburgs. From 1519 to 1713, it was occupied by the Spanish, and from 1713 to 1794, by the Austrians.
From 1795 until the end of the Napoleonic wars, the present territory of Belgium was under the political control of France and French became the general administrative and cultural language. At the Congress of Vienna in 1815, however, Holland and Belgium were united to form a single kingdom under the Dutch monarch, and in 1822 Flemish was raised to the status of an official language. With the breaking of the Dutch-Belgian connection in 1830 and the establishment of the independent Kingdom of Belgium in the following year, the French language again became dominant.The cultural and political differences between the Flemings and the French-speaking Walloons remained a source of tension. In a single federal structure, Belgium combined six million speakers of Flemish (a local variant of Dutch) in the northern region of Flanders, three million French speakers in the southern region of Wallonia, a multi-cultural population of one million in the bilingual capital (Brussels), and a 70,000-strong German-speaking population in the east.
Belgium declared neutrality in both World War I and World War II but was overrun and occupied by Nazi Germany (1914-18; 1940-44).
Flanders and Wallonia were established as distinct linguistic regions in 1930 and demonstrations by Flemish speakers in the 1960s led, in 1962, to the establishment of a formal linguistic border.
Until the 1950s, Flanders remained predominantly agricultural, while industrial Wallonia was the economic powerhouse of Belgium. However, when Wallonia's iron and steel industries collapsed in the 1960s, Flanders, with its sea ports, enjoyed a boom in its automobile, chemical, and textile industries, eclipsing Wallonia as the dominant economic region. Flemish-speakers increasingly felt unwilling to subsidise Wallonia and Flemish business executives campaigned for greater independence for Flanders.
Calls for greater decentralisation gathered pace in the 1970s when the government began a process of regionalisation. In 1993 Belgium became a federal state consisting of the regions of Flanders, Wallonia, and the bilingual capital Brussels.
Yves Leterme became prime minister-designate after his opposition Christian Democrats and Flemish (CDV) emerged as the strongest party in a general election in June 2007, defeating the centre-left liberal and socialist coalition led by the Liberals and Democrats (VLD). Leterme, formerly the leader of the Flanders regional government, strongly supported increased autonomy for the Flemish-speaking region of Flanders.
Deadlock over Flemish autonomy prevented the formation of a permanent administration for nine months after the election. It was the longest period in history that Belgium had been without a government. During that time, Leterme, who had been charged by King Albert with forming a government, twice resigned from the task.
In August 2007, Leterme tendered his resignation after the parties of the proposed government alliance failed to agree on major constitutional reforms. Reappointed to the task, Leterme in December 2007 abandoned his second attempt to form a government afer coalition talks collapsed again, when the Flemish parties angered their French-speaking partners by voting for the break-up of a bilingual electoral district of Brussels, known as Brussels-Halle-Vilvoorde (BHV). The approval of the measure would have taken away the right of some 120,000 French speakers in the Flemish suburbs to vote for French-speaking parties outside their locality. Belgian RTF radio described the vote as a "historic moment" because it effectively abandoned Belgium's tradition of consensus and compromise.
After Leterme's second resignation, King Albert invited outgoing Prime Minister Guy Verhofstadt to form an interim administration to deal with urgent matters such as constitutional reform and the drafting of the 2008 budget. Verhofstadt mustered a five-party coalition and an interim caretaker cabinet was appointed.
In February 2008, the coalition parties reached agreement on limited constitutional reform, under which Flanders and Wallonia would each take control of their own economic and industrial policy, as well as housing and agriculture, hitherto the responsibilities of central government.
In March 2008, Leterme was appointed prime minister, leading the same coalition. Leterme's CDV party set a deadline of July 15 for further powers to be acceded to Flanders but the French-speaking coalition parties remained opposed to further regional devolution. As the deadline approached without any further agreement on regional devolution, Leterme on July 14 tendered his resignation.- Click here to browse the timeline (free)
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