VLAAMS BELANG BACK IN BUSINESS

From Wim Haelsterman, Brussels, for AFF/Verzet-RésistanceS

The local elections held in Belgium on Sunday 15 October turned out good news for the fascist Vlaams Belang (VB), all of a sudden back in business after a decade of electoral slump and defeats that nearly killed the party, the Green parties in both Flanders and French-speaking Belgium and for the Communist Party PVDA/PTB. The latter made a remarkable breakthrough and now has numerous elected candidates across cities and towns in Flanders, Brussels and Wallonia.

The return of the fascists onto the political stage is remarkable. In most cities, the party, almost completely punctured by the democratic Flemish nationalist N-VA in recent years, managed to claw back good results in the Antwerp region but most of all in smaller Flemish cities on the outskirts of Brussels where the party became the most popular.

In Ninove, a small town in the province of East-Flanders, the list of Vlaams Belang MP D’Haeseleer achieved 40% of the votes and might post the first VB town mayor ever. It is clear that the VB has been able to recuperate at least a part of the electorate it lost systematically to the N-VA and its charismatic leader Bart De Wever in recent years.

VB chairman Tom Van Grieken has invited the N-VA leader to open the doors for collaboration with his party, to break down the cordon sanitaire against the VB and to put a real Flemish nationalist policy into practice at local level with sharp focus on immigration and criminality.

According to first reports, the N-VA leadership is not inclined to do so at all.