sex and politics

He’s back, ladies and gentlemen! Dr. Arf has resurfaced to continue his legendary series about Belgium and its woes. Will Belgium disintegrate and steal the limelight from Kosovo, or will the most European of EU members get its act together and keep going? Find out in the latest installment of dr. Arf’s Belgium Explained To Slovenes (And Whoever Else ) In Ten Easy Lessons!

LESSON VII : HOW TO MESS UP YOUR CHANCES OF BECOMING BELGIUM’S NEW GOVERNMENT/PM IN FIVE EASY NEWSPAPER ARTICLES

Yes, Dr. ARF is finally back with the concluding entries to the ‘Belgium’ saga. I’ve been overcome with work lately, and there simply was no time left to write blog entries. But I know our P.’s own blog posts were interesting enough to not make you miss mine too much.

Yves Leterme

SO, HOW’S BELGIUM DOING RIGHT NOW?

It’s still loads of fun here, politically speaking. Why? Because, unlike the generations preceding them, the Modern Day Elected have a really big problem with keeping their mouths shut; especially to the media. Whereas former government formation negotiations bore an uncanny resemblance to the Vatican choosing a new pope behind closed doors and with no outside communications, nowadays we find they can’t seem to leave their Blackberries and mobile phones alone. I’m amazed none of their wives (or husbands) have threatened with impending divorce yet. “You love that Blackberry more than me!!!” Oh well, in that case, our supposed new leader, Yves Leterme, still has his goat. But still, how is ‘ol’ Eve’ doing government wise?

THE GOVERNMENT THAT JUST WON’T GET INTO OFFICE

Not so well, as it happens. The Walloon politicians already hated his guts and chastised his party, CD&V, every chance they got for getting together with the Flemish Nationalists of NV-A. Not only political Wallonia hated his guts, the Wallonian media liked him as much as a hole in the head, much to his chagrin. Over the course of last year’s negotiations, Leterme became known for his public chastising (we Belgians are masochists by nature, due to this age old inferiority complex) of the French speaking media. It even went so far that he berated the francophone national broadcast corporation RTBf and generally adopted an attitude of ‘you’re my buddies, the only ones I can trust’ toward its Flemish counterpart, VRT; seemingly a garden of delights for our Yves in those days.

Be that as it may, the result of the negotiations was absolute zero. Sure, they had a few partial agreements, a think tank would pore its combined brain cells over the illustrious state reform in the upcoming months, but a government, or a national budget? Sorry, constituents. We’ve lost too much time bickering and whining to the press to get to that. Mea maxima culpa. NOT.

So it was off to our good king Albert II for a – I lost count – third time (cautious estimate) for another round of talks. I won’t bore you with the details, but the end of it all was that we did get a prime minister and a cabinet : Guy Verhostadt, acting PM, would continue until Easter, Match 23rd, by which time the parties who won the elections way back when (I vaguely recall it was some time in June) would have sufficient agreements to start governing. You’d think they’d all sit in silence and work towards that goal. Not so. The Flemish liberal VLD ministers are trying to enforce new elections by constantly criticizing their future government partners, especially Yves Leterme – who landed a minister post in the interim government, as well as being vice – PM - and in fact do a better job at criticizing their own government than the opposition! And of course, all negotiation partners had to honour their agreement with the press to go over the botched negotiations with a fine tooth comb. And this week, it seemed some, if not all, took that a bit too literal…

WE LOVE THE PRESS

This week, the De Standaard newspaper – once upon a time the reference for conservative christian integrity and thus of christian democrat persusasion – is publishing a series about the botched government negotiations. Some tenors had already given interviews with other media, but this was different, as the newspaper had agreed with all key players to go over the whole period and give insight into the negotiations. I don’t read newspapers, so I was oblivious to the whole thing, until a massive row ensued, which had the media in uproar. Not only did the interviewed dignitaries talk about their negotiations, it also seemed they showed the journalists text messages from one politician to another, blackberry conversations and – stop the presses!!!! – literal quotes from their talks with King Albert II. Even worse, they quoted him, while he is supposed to maintain a public neutrality! The shock!! The horror!!

See, Albie said a couple of things that certain parties would take exception to, like, suggesting to Yves Leterme to cut loose NV-A, because he didn’t like them weighing on the negotiations. Much to the chagrin of said party, Ol’ Eve admitted NV-A were a millstone around his neck and would like nothing more. See, there’s a protocol for these matters, called ‘Colloque Singulier’, which kind of means ‘Private Conversation’. If the monarch can’t have such talks with the politicians without having them published virtually the next day, he is unable to say anything to anyone anymore, because he has to maintain said neutrality at least in public. Mark Eyskens (CD&V, retired), having been PM himself, as was his father, said in an interview these leaks were deliberate attempts to discredit the monarchy. I wouldn’t be surprised if he’s right, but on the other hand, I am a republican, thus have no love for it anyway.

I do, however, feel that this leaking has gone several bridges too far. If you agree to maintain silence about something, you should. Not one politician in this whole ordeal has adhered to any agreement made about the confidentiality of the negotiation talks, be it amongst themselves or with the monarch. Now, I know leaks are part and parcel of the political game, but what has transpired here of the past nine months is so out of line that it definitely hindered the government formation and we’re now having a ridiculous farce that’s called an interim government, led by the Guy who should have been the former PM by now and although the Easter date is being held up as the installment date of the ‘real’ new government, the recent events clearly show that the path towards it is rocky, narrow and full of holes. Not surprisingly, Yves Leterme is being made scape (the man should stop breeding the beasties, it’s way too easy to make jokes about this :P) of the whole series in De Standaard. So much, even, that editor in chief Peter Vandermeersch had to come to his defense and state that all key players contributed to the series, so it wasn’t just Leterme who gave insight into his Blackberry records and his private talks with King Albert II.

In short, you wouldn’t believe it if you didn’t see it. Politicians, virtually rolling across the floor fighting amongst each other, in order to get the upper hand like children in a playground. And meanwhile, the country just rolls on as if it doesn’t need a government anyway. Day to day lives aren’t being affected by all this, which to some observers begs the question whether we still need a government at all. I say we do, if only to counter the outgrowths of globalized economies and a perfidious capitalist system (and no, I’m not a commie bastard; I just call it like I see it). But this is a display so shameful, I’m starting to long for the Stalinist manner of government and corrupt administration days of the 70’s and 80’s…

By the way, Yves Leterme this week said he’d find it ‘uncouth’ if he wouldn’t be PM of the Easter Government. Yah, sure, Eve; whatever you say…

Dr. ARF

LESSON VI : AND NOW FOR SOMETHING COMPLETELY RECENT : THE GOVERNMENT NEGOTIATIONS – BELGIUM’S FINAL DEATH BLOW?

(Picture : PhotoNews)

At first I was having a laugh about everything that happened at the so- called government formation talks since the last elections. But I’m not laughing anymore, as day after day, it becomes crystal clear that Flanders and Wallonia are digging their political trenches instead of trying to find common ground. A recap…

WALLOONS AREN’T INTELLECTUALLY CAPABLE OF LEARNING FLEMISH

… is what our current formation leader and CD&V spearhead Yves Leterme said in a pre-election interview the… Wallonian media. Having allied themselves with the Flemish nationalist/separatist party NV-A (no, not the Viet Cong, but Nieuwe Vlaamse Alliantie (New Flemish Alliance)) in a cartel – not to traffic drugs from Colombia, but to win elections, which they did – the CD&V created unrest in Wallonia, where the politicians firmly said they would never accept Leterme – who is half Walloon by way of his father – as prime minister, because he demanded the in Wallonia much dreaded state reform, which would divide federal funding and authorities for several departments – like social security, something that doesn’t sit well in Wallonia, where unemployment is rife – to the regions. Walloons persistently present this state reform as ‘a hollowing out of the federal structure’. Furthermore, he made the statement above, which resulted in a media witch hunt where everything Leterme says is being perceived as an anti-walloon and anti national government sentiment. Try to lead formation talks that way…

LETERME SINGS (AND IT MIGHT BE THE BLUES EVENTUALLY)

Everything Leterme says and does is scrutinized. Take, for instance, the fact that a TV journalist from RTBF asked him on the national holiday (July 21st ) if he knew the national anthem and if he could sing it. In response, Leterme sang… La Marseillaise . Huge cause for consternation down South, as ‘Leterme doesn’t even know the ‘Brabançonne’ is our national anthem, so he doesn’t care about this country!’.



The incriminating clip

Fact : 99% of the Belgian populace DO NOT KNOW THEIR OWN NATIONAL ANTHEM. Could have something to do with the fact that it’s not a drinking song (which I find infinitely cooler, kudos Slovenija!), but in fact, Flemings and Walloons only come together as Belgians at sports manifestations. It went so far that the Belgian Football (that is soccer to y’all Yanks :P) Association instructed the players for the national team to learn the lyrics by heart because they could be seen mumbling something or other or not moving their lips altogether when the national anthem was played before the matches (but they keep losing anyway :twisted:). So while Leterme probably doesn’t differ from his fellow countrymen on both sides of the language border, his leadership capabilities are as much in question in Wallonia as Bill Clinton’s were during the Lewinsky Affair. The long and short of it is that in neither case their leadership capabilities should be questioned, because they have nothing to do with it.

SO WILL STATE REFORM BE THE UNDOING OF BELGIUM?

There is no way of knowing just yet, but there is a real crisis. The Wallonian politicians find the Flemish demands for thorough state reform unacceptable, especially the aforementioned social security as well as fiscality (it is true that Wallonian policy makers are a bit more, erm, creative when it comes to taxes and more lenient toward those ducking them). So they launched a counter proposition, in which among other things they wanted to redefine the position of Flemings in Brussel (read : they want Brussels to become part of Wallonia with Flemings reduced to requiring special facilities, just like the francophones in the Flemish suburbs surrounding the nation’s capital.). Even a blind person can see that hell will freeze over three times before the Flemish politicians allow this.

So what is going to happen next? In a surprise move, king Albert II has returned from his holiday and will have talks with representatives of all parties involved in the government formation. This, to my knowledge at least, has never happened before in Belgium’s history. As I stated in a former post, the king’s role is restricted and he isn’t allowed to interfere in political affairs. That it would take such a move to defuse this crisis is a grave indication that all is not well over here. Everybody keeps acting as if the elephant isn’t in the room, but it’s there. The elephant in question is the undoing of this country. What was a mockumentary that had two thirds of Wallonia scared shitless is now threatening to become real (and the mockumentary itself reinforced the belief down South that Flemings are all separatists, which doesn’t help the present situation; thanks RTBF!).

But we’re not there yet. And I personally believe Belgium will at least continue to exist until the next national elections which is, if all goes well, in five years. But the stage is set. While I may be accused of predicting doom, I find it very feasible that even now a civil war could break out if the negotiations take too long. People are following this on both sides of the language border, they listen to their own versions of what’s going on through their own media and all it would take is one wrong word out of the mouth of a Fleming to a Wallonian or vice versa. The reason why I say this, is because we have the extreme nationalist party Vlaams Belang, who took lessons from their Nazi counterparts and could instigate riots just the same as the NSDAP did in the 30’s when Germany was in an unstable political and economical state. I worry about this, as they’ve been keeping unnaturally quiet lately. Even so, with or without civil war, I am very certain that what the picture above portrays will happen sometime in the not so distant future. Can I apply for asylum in Slovenija now?

Dr. ARF

Naturally, br dr. Arf

LESSON V : WORLD WAR II AND ITS IMPACT ON BELGIUM

WWII veterans memorial in Brussels. Photo by Guilliaume Dubé (source)

I briefly touched on this in the first two guest posts to explain how a portion of the Flemings looked to Germany to ‘liberate’ them from Wallonian/French occupation. This week, we’ll get a bit deeper into the matter, keeping in line with P’s post earlier this week about this subject…

ET POUR LES FLAMANDS LA MÊME CHOSE

The gripes of the Flemings, as noted, lay in the fact they were rated as second class citizens in Belgium. This was especially evidenced in World War I, when Flemish men served as cannon fodder – as many as 80% of the Belgian casualties were Flemish - and were subject of derision of the francophone officer corps. The phrase ‘Et pour les Flamands la meme chose’ still exists in our language culture as a reminder of this. Of course, it didn’t take long before a reaction to oppose to this treatment took shape, when the Flemish intellectuals founded the ‘Frontbeweging’ (Front Movement). After the WW I, they would take the lead in ensuring a monument was erected to remember the fallen. It was called the ‘IJzertoren’, after the fierce battle along the banks of the IJzer river during WW I. One of those aligned with the movement was catholic priest Cyriel Verschaeve. A romantic Flemish nationalist for most part, he would come to play a dubious part in the coming world war…

THE POLITICAL SIDE OF THINGS

Meanwhile, the Flemish hadn’t sat still on the political side of things. The first party to come to prominence was VERDINASO. The acronym stands for Verbond van Dietsche Nationaal Solidaristen (Union of Diets National Solidarists). They were led by Joris Van Severen, a charismatic dandy- like figure who evolved the party’s ideology from fervent anti- belgicist to ‘whole Dutch’, which means a unification of Belgium, Luxemburg, French Flanders (the north- western region of France, including Lille and Roubaix, which were, historically speaking, part of County Flanders) and the Netherlands, supported on the Netherlands’ geographical situation under Emperor Charles V. This party was fascist in structure, and Van Severen put together a militia of what he called ‘the best and brightest’, which were named ‘Brown Shirts’ and later, during German occupation, ‘Black Shirts’ after their uniform colours. Interestingly, they were financially supported by both The Vatican as well as dear old Adolf Hitler himself. The first had high hopes for VERDINASO, because they were rabiate anti- communist in nature and the latter, well, it doesn’t take a lot of guesswork to find what Adolf was after, right?

A word of explanation on ‘Diets’. It is a name to describe the language spoken in Holland and Belgium in around the 16th and 17th century, but for all Flemish movements, like VERDINASO that strove for reunification with Holland and become a separate entity within the Pan- Germanic Ideology of Nazi Germany. It’s also the basis for the English word Dutch, often confused with Duits (German).

Another pro- German and anti Belgian party, was Staf de Clerq’s VNV (I’m wondering whether the guys of VNV Nation are aware of this :mrgreen:). VNV in this case stands for Vlaams Nationaal Verbond (Flemish National Alliance). They were a force to be reckoned with and even got 16 parliamentary seats in the national election of 1936. De Lerq had a warped sense of humor when it came to dealing with Uncle Adolf’s invasion hunger. In 1939 he wrote in a pamphlet that VNV would be the first line of defense if Hitler ‘get it into his head to invade’ and they would kick damn good arse, but that tone was slightly altered into ‘Let’s cooperate with our Germanic brethren! They’re cool!’ after Hitler secured Belgium’s addition to Gross Deutschland. They, too, had a military bridage, called the Grey Shirts (guess why :P) and when they were merged with VERDINASO in 1941, the both of them became the feared Black Shirt Brigade.

So, did the Walloons sit still when it came to fascism? No way, Jose! They had REX and its El Maximo Lidér Léon Degrelle. The party, born out of Degrelle’s frustration with catholic politicians and clergy and a pro- fascist and anti- Marxist ideology rose to prominence in the years before WW II and even managed to get 21 seats in parliament as well as 14 in the Senate. They even had a Flemish pendant in REX Vlaanderen. They got their financial support from Benito Mussolini himself.

If you read this, you must conclude we had a great bunch of collaborators over here, didn’t we?

DURING THE WAR

So Adolf invades and it all comes together. VNV had the most clout, as Van Severen turned against the anti- Belgian sentiments and chose the government’s side when Hitler invaded. Still, he was arrested, sent to a prison camp in France, bur murdered by French soldiers on the way there.
VERDINASO, in the mean time, was usurped by VNV, and REX was marginalized, but still in (puppet) power in Wallonia. REX Vlaanderen was usurped by VNV, just as VERDINASO was. Both were forced to do this under German pressure. This didn’t bode well wit the REXists, who massively left the party. Several VERDINASO and VNV prominents who felt betrayed by the Germans, also chose to go underground and fight on the secret resistance’s side during the war.

Cyriel Verschaeve actively started to draft people to fight with the Germans on the Eastern Front against the Soviet Union, still under the romantic notion that Flanders would be free under Germand reign.
VNV officially drafted people into service and actively helped to round up Jews for deportation. They, like VERDINASO and REX, had always had an anti- semitic sentiment, so it’s no surprise they willingly cooperated in the Jewish deportations in Belgium.
Their dreams of Flemish or even Diets/Dutch independence were squashed by the German occupiers, though.

AFTER THE WAR

Suffice it to say that these parties became outlawed after the war and were subject to what is called ‘The Repression’ in collaboration circles. Party members were incarcerated, stripped of their citizenship rights and generally harassed, just like non- denominational economic collaborators and women who had ‘fraternized’ with the enemy.
Staf De Clerq died in 1942, while his successor had already died on the Eastern Front. The more moderate Hendrik Elias then succeeded De Clerq and was sentenced to jail until he was released early due to deteriorating health issues.
Cyriel Verschaeve, given an honorary doctorate at the University of Köln, was evacuated by the SS to Austria, where he stayed until he died in 1949 in Solbad Hall. His body was exhumed by a ‘commando unit’ of the extreme right paramilitary organization VMO (Flemish Militant Order) under leadership of Bert Eriksson, to be reburied in Flemish soil. Eriksson claims to have done the same with the remains of Staf de Clerq, whose grave was defaced and ransacked by former resistance fighters.
Léon Degrelle escaped to Spain and was never extradited because he was close to Spain’s dictator Franco. He died in Malaga in 1994 from cardiac arrest. In the 80’s, he got into the news again, after having given a remarkable TV interview, which displayed his revisionist, fascist and anti semitic nature for all to see.
But the real victims here, are the people who actually followed these men and, of course, their multitude of victims. Through both their and REX’s efforts, a Flemish and Wallonian SS legion fought on the Eastern Front. Suffice it to say, they were looked down upon by their ‘true’ German counterparts, which would count for a lot of frustration after the war and result in minds twisted into negating the whole episode and glorifying it, since they were ousted by their own people as traitors when they came home. Some of the most die hard pro Hitler SS veterans today still hang on to their service in the SS on the Eastern Front as their only remaining measure of pride and self esteem. Having read interviews with these people, I am always baffled by their twisted line of reasoning so as to justify themselves and their deeds, while at the same time recognizing that these men are just as well the victims as the deported Jews, intellectuals, gays, resistance fighters and other undesirables under the Nazi regime. It accounts to a lot of hurt, anger and unresolved issues on both sides of the fence. One has to recognize that, especially in the case of some economic collaborators and women who fell in love with German soldiers, these people had no choice than to collaborate. You can’t choose who you fall in love with, right? And what would YOU do if your family’s well being was at stake? Not everyone is brave enough to stand up against troops with the overwhelming convincing arguments that are machine guns, deportation, plunder and rape.
An organization of Eastern Front veterans still gathers together every year, to sing old songs they sang together, recount old war stories and remember fallen comrades while flying the flag of their SS legion. It’s all they have left after a life of service for the wrong side and to be honest, I myself don’t begrudge these octogenarians their annual get- together. It’s all they have left in a life that’s not left them with much after they made the wrong choice for whatever reason. The general public didn’t even remember them until a moderate Flemish Nationalist politician was seen in their midst, after which old issues came to a head again. Belgium hasn’t finished its World War II yet, that much is certain. Only when the last survivor is dead, then might we attempt to start to come to terms with what happened. Might, because as long as extreme right Flemish Nationalist parties like Front Nationale and Vlaams Belang (who used to be named Vlaams Blok, after VNV’s moniker ‘Vlaams Nationaal Blok’ when they won their parliamentary seats in 1936) keep using VERDINASO’s and VNV’s political ideologies and strategies – not to mention the latter’s fascist party structure – to keep raising hate and racism and instill fear into the hearts and minds of the Wallonian and Flemish citizens.

And it’s not just Belgium that still reels from the after effects of this war. On route to visit Slovenia for the second time, in 2002, I encountered a friendly Bavarian man on his way to a friend’s birthday. He started talking to me, noticed I wasn’t German and we got to talking. When the subject turns to politics the man suddenly tells me : “You know, I still feel so ashamed for what we did to your country and others in the war”. Tears welled up in his eyes and I was quick to console him and say ‘Sir, this was a long time ago and we should be able to forgive and look to the future.” His answer was : “Yes, you’re right. But still…” We sat there in silence for a moment, pondering how a war that started sixty plus years ago still had such an effect on the both of us, talking in 2002. “Bury your dead and move on”? It’ll be a while yet, I fear…

Dr. ARF