Political scientist Dave Sinardet: ‘I can imagine that the voters of Dewinter are also sensitive to what is now coming to light’

Professor Sinardet, are you still surprised by something? Humo and Apache write about Filip Dewinter’s Chinese hands-on services?

“Many things were already known, but these articles add additional evidence. Until now he was able to maintain that he was not paid for it in the strict sense, but now there is proof of this. There is 3,000 euros for organizing a theme day, but also for submitting expenses for, for example, dinners. If you can submit that many and get reimbursed by China, that is also a form of compensation.”

Dewinter continues to wash his hands of innocence and denies that he provided services for the Chinese Communist Party through contact. How credible is that?

“To say that dinners with far-right politicians or a meeting with the Syrian ambassador have nothing to do with politics is like saying that the Pope has nothing to do with the Catholic Church. His claim that he thought he was working with the Chinese Tourism Board is also quite bizarre. He’s not that naive, is he? You may think that at the very beginning, but after that you don’t anymore. It is becoming clearer and clearer that there is much more going on. His defense is no longer credible.

“Dewinter has made a career on these kinds of issues, with his discourse on corruption and the greed of the political class. If a politician from another party were to be discredited by such an affair, Dewinter would immediately jump on it. I can imagine that Dewinter’s voters are also sensitive to what is now coming to light and that he is losing credibility with them.”

To what extent are the revelations about Dewinter detrimental to Vlaams Belang?

“This is becoming more and more harmful, more than with Frank Creyelman (he was expelled from the party in December when it became known that he was spying for China, ed.). Because Dewinter is a figurehead of the party, but also because it clashes with what the party started for. For example, the Vlaams Belang is against illegal immigration, but Dewinter is keeping a close eye on someone who has committed fraud with his work permit. As a Flemish nationalist party, Vlaams Belang stands up for Flanders, but sometimes it seems to be more concerned with Chinese and Russian interests. For a party that has always railed against the radical left, this is strange to say the least.

“You can still explain ideologically and historically that the PVDA has ties with China. But that Vlaams Belang has ties with a communist country? Dewinter regularly accuses the Turkish and Moroccan communities of being a fifth column of extremist Islam, but at the same time he himself participates in political interference by powers with little democratic inspiration, such as China and Russia.

But will it hurt the party in the elections? If you can believe the polls, the Creyelman affair did not cost the party any votes. After all, these are not exactly the files that keep people awake at night. You also have to know something about international politics to appreciate the seriousness of it. But still: you don’t have to be a China expert to see that this behavior is at odds with many things that Vlaams Belang claims to stand for. And Dewinter is a much better known figurehead to the general public than Creyelman.”

Vlaams Belang chairman Tom Van Grieken expelled Frank Creyelman because he spied for China. Will the same happen to Filip Dewinter?

“A lesser god would have long been dismissed, or at least sidetracked, after such revelations. But Filip Dewinter still has so much power within the party that Van Grieken’s authority over Dewinter remains limited. When Dewinter went to a Golden Dageraad meeting in 2016 (a Greek far-right party, ed.)Van Grieken did reprimand him, but it didn’t go much further. In December, during the Creyelman case, he also escaped the dance.

“Vlaams Belang still remains somewhat Dewinter’s party. Since Van Grieken showed in 2019 that he can push the party to electoral heights, this has diminished, but his power is still there. Federally he may be the list pusher for the next elections, but he will remain the list leader for the Antwerp municipal elections. Van Grieken must continue to take Dewinter into account and grant him his playground.”

Van Grieken reiterated this weekend that Vlaams Belang wants to participate in governance. Could this throw a spanner in the works?

“Bart De Wever continuously says that he does not want to govern with Vlaams Belang as long as there are dubious figures walking around there. Dries Van Langenhove is already gone. Suppose Dewinter now also ends up on a side track, that obstacle would also have been removed and the N-VA’s argument for not doing business with Vlaams Belang would have disappeared. But that’s mainly ‘supposing that’. You feel that Dewinter still has too much power in the party.”