About BELGIUM

My special comments today are about BELGIUM.  Why? Because several of you have asked for it. And also because there is always a lot to tell about our country - also politically. Perhaps we will have general elections again soon.  I will come back to that on another day.

We have now lived here for more than 31 years. And we intend to stay for 31 years more - at least!  But despite of all these lovely years here we have to admit, that we still do not quite understand Belgian politics. We have comfort from many "real Belgians" telling us that if somebody says he or she understands Belgian politics, then it is because he or she has had it badly explained!

We have understood something, though. When Danes and others say to us: Ah, Belgium - this is the country with no government!  Then is it absolutely wrong. They have not just ONE government. They have at least 6 governments. Belgium is a federal country with regions with lots of tasks and responsabilities. Too many, some people think. Brits and Danes often believe that federal Means centralised.  Let them talk to a Belgian.  Then this delution will be killed. And even though the ongoing and very difficult negotiations on forming a new central government ( after the elections on May 26 last year) are continuing we have a fully operational and well-functioning federal government.  The prime minister is for the first time a woman, Sophie Wilmès - a former colleague of mine in the Commission, by the way.
You can also say that the many governments mean that the country can be governed , even if one of the other government, such as the central government, perhaps is not up to full speed.

Belgium is geographically the same size as Jutland in Denmark ( 30.000 sq.km. ) and has 11 million inhabitants. It is known that about 1000 wars have been fought on Belgian soil over the centuries. So it is not difficult to understand that the Belgians do not want more of them. This is one of the reasons why Europe and a strong cooperation in Europe is not part of the political discussions here.

I will come back to that in my coming comments about the main issues in Belgian politics.

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