“No new, but additional tightened supervision”: Governor Jos Lantmeeters responds to news about the city council of Sint-Truiden | Sint Truiden

At the end of 2022, the city also came under increased supervision by the governor after various reports from Audit Flanders showed that everything was going wrong in the fruit city. A few months ago, the council of aldermen again came into the sights of Audit Flanders after several complaints about files where there was an appearance of a conflict of interest with companies that had a link with four aldermen.

Previously, there was talk of new increased supervision that was invoked by Flemish Minister of the Interior Gwendolyn Rutten (Open Vld), but Limburg Governor Jos Lantmeeters says that the increased supervision has never been lifted. “The city government has been under supervision for some time, since after the corona period,” said Governor Lantmeeters. “At the time, Bart Somers was also Minister of the Interior. This increased supervision is of indefinite duration and has never been lifted for the time being, even when Minister Rutten succeeded him.”

“Audit Flanders has already conducted several audits at the city council of Sint-Truiden, the last of which was in connection with the illegal loan to former mayor Jef Cleeren. Because the minister wants to answer some additional questions in connection with the latest audit, we have introduced additional increased supervision.”

The latest report from Audit Flanders concerns government contracts that have been issued over the past 11 years and where companies that can be linked to aldermen Carl Nijssens, Hilde Vautmans, Jos Pierard and Peter Deltour supplied the goods or services.

For example, various communication assignments were carried out by advertising company ZOZ, of which Nijssens is one of the managers. The name of alderman and MEP Hilde Vautmans also appeared after she voted between 2014 and 2019 in files where the appointment of the Bouwen & Milieu company as soil remediation expert was requested. Her cousin was in charge there at the time.

In addition, the IJzerwaren Pierard company, of which municipal councilor Jos Pierard was managing director until 2018, supplied materials to the city from 2014 to 2022. The business is currently run by Jeroen and Rutger Frissaer, relatives of the municipal councilor. In this file, Audit Flanders itself states that it cannot estimate whether the family bond is too close.

A final file concerns current councilor Peter Deltour, who is also on the board of directors of the autonomous municipal company Patri. Since 2021, he and his son have been managers of Ovis Spiritts, which supplied several bottles of spirits to both the city and Patri. The audit report shows that “there were (possibly) serious violations of the law” at this board.

The audit report shows that “there were (possibly) serious violations of the law” at this board. Rutten therefore asks Governor Jos Lantmeeters to place the city under additional increased supervision and to invite the mayor and competent aldermen of the local government to discuss measures. The city council must also discuss the audit report at the next municipal council.

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