LETTER FROM BRUSSELS
Is she bored with her regime of wobbly coalitions? Is it seized by the desire for imitation or eager to find a real adversary? During the period between the two rounds of the French presidential election, political and media Belgium has, in any case, largely played with the theme of a possible seizure of power by the far right in its big neighbour. To justify, a posteriori, their insistence on evoking this risk, media and commentators then supported the thesis that Emmanuel Macron had, in fact, been “miselected”.
Beyond that, one thing remains obvious: if all its neighbors (Flanders in the lead, but also France, Germany, the Netherlands and even Luxembourg) have seen the emergence of far-right formations, the Wallonia- Brussels (or the French Community of Belgium) is surprisingly preserved. In recent decades, all attempts to hatch a xenophobic or national-populist current there have, in fact, failed or resulted in settling of scores between the few protagonists of this current.
The nasty tongues say that it is the lack of identity of the two regions which explains this singularity: difficult to play on the nationalist rope in a region of Brussels symbolized by the “zinneke” (the bastard, the corniaud) with mixed or multi-ethnic origins. Or in a Wallonia which, even if it still cultivates nostalgia for its defunct wealth, does not sink into the quest for identity.
No extreme right in sight, therefore, but a kind of latent fear, a constant concern to talk about it, to understand, to debate. It was precisely to debate that Georges-Louis Bouchez, young president of the Reform Movement (MR), a center-right liberal party, broke a taboo: he went to confront each other, Thursday, April 21, on a set of the chain Flemish public VRT, to Tom Van Grieken, the equally young president of Vlaams Belang, a separatist, xenophobic formation, well anchored on the far right (she is, alongside the French National Rally, a member of the group Identity and Democracy in Parliament European).
“A red line has been crossed”
Following the debate between the two French suitors, the VRT wanted to organize a “mirror debate” between a supposed macronist – the MR is a member, like La République en Marche, of the Renew group in Strasbourg – and proven support from Marine Le Pen. This crossing of a double border (linguistic and ideological) by a French-speaking leader has generated a storm: for twenty years, all the parties in the south of Belgium have respected, like the media, a “sanitary cordon”. Which means there is no question of alliances, negotiations, or talks with extremist leaders.
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