There is a certain despondency in the double interview that chairmen Bart De Wever (N-VA) and Paul Magnette (PS) granted to the sister newspapers The time and L’Echo. The two political heavyweights exchange, as usual, their opposing views: one (De Wever) accuses the other of governing with a hole in the hand, the other (Magnette) accuses the one of a reckless austerity plan… and that was that. As if you are watching the almost routine mutual hostilities on a frozen war front. Sometimes things explode, but no one makes any progress.
The problem with the interview is that the setting is no longer correct. The two party leaders position themselves as the symbolic leaders in their state with a mandate to transform the country together. They no longer have that authority.
The duel involuntarily brings back memories of the 2014 campaign, when De Wever and Magnette fought each other in a live debate in front of the same media. De Wever became the rhetorical winner of that debate, with his memorable swipe at the budgetary lack of credibility of the Di Rupo government: “Show me the money!” − a discovery he made with Tom Cruise and Cuba Gooding Jr. made in the nineties movie Jerry Maguire.
For Bart De Wever, that moment probably marked the height of his power. The Flemish nationalist was about to achieve a historic election victory (N-VA would receive 32.5 percent of the Flemish votes in 2014) by uniting right-wing nationalist Flanders behind the idea that things would really be different with him.
As a reminder: the Flemish center parties from the Di Rupo government also made progress (except for the then SP.A) despite the N-VA bashing, which at the time mainly drained the far right. Paul Magnette was also still the (interim) chairman of a large party that provided the prime minister at that time, although the PS would drop from 36 to 31 percent in 2014.
Kissing Jupiter
That is completely different now. That realization does not seem to have sunk in yet. There is a very real chance that both N-VA and the PS will have to say goodbye to their status as ‘major parties’ on June 9 after new and heavy losses. Nothing is certain before the ballot boxes are emptied, but both parties are currently polling slightly above 20 percent. If that is also the approximate election result, it would mean that N-VA and PS have lost no less than a third of their voting public in ten years.
In short, these are no longer the parties that can pretend to speak on behalf of their entire region or community. In Flanders, the N-VA still towers above the center parties, but the leading position will most likely go to the far right. But even in French-speaking Belgium it is not entirely certain that the PS will remain the largest. In Brussels, the MR has already surpassed the PS, which is rushing in all directions in panic, and in the rest of French-speaking Belgium, the red lead is shrinking.
This almost historical evolution – the provisional end of the major parties – is in danger of being lost in the everyday political spectacle. However, it is indeed of fundamental importance. The dynamics of the power relations between the parties are completely changing. The almost confederal idea that two rulers each set the tone in their own area and the rest must follow suit, is disappearing.
MR chairman Georges-Louis Bouchez is well aware of this. “Bart De Wever and Paul Magnette think they are more than anyone else: when they talk to each other, they have the impression that they can kiss Jupiter,” he said in the newspaper. La Libre. In Humo CD&V chief Sammy Mahdi said something similar: “De Wever must realize that he is not the only one at the table. The equator does not run through the Schoon Verdiep.”
The classic trade-off ‘more Flemish autonomy for French-language refinancing’ threatens to reach a dead end. The federal treasury is also empty
It is no coincidence that Bouchez and Mahdi, who actually get along quite well, put their foot in the door. By clinging to their sister party across the language border in accordance with the principle of ‘out together, home together’, the liberals and the gaining strength Christian Democrats are firmly in the middle of the chessboard. If those two political centrist families really work together after the elections (and if Open Vld does not completely collapse), they could well form the engine block of the next federal government.
The chance is already quite small that the next cabinet will wear the Vivaldi colors again, whatever Bart De Wever may say about that. “A transitional government”, is how Magnette and Bouchez described the De Croo government in a strikingly identical way. Sounds like a polite wording for ‘not worth repeating’. By strengthening ties with the Flemish liberals, Georges-Louis Bouchez has largely neutralized the risk that the PS would form governments without the MR (with Les Engagés in their place).
The most logical coalition formula seems to be that the greens drop out and that both socialists (PS and Vooruit) and N-VA join. With fewer games it will simply be mathematically very close after June 9. Notice the difference: the idea of two parties making a community deal that everyone else has to swallow is completely gone. That’s not all that surprising. Already in 2019, a similar and very provisional agreement between De Wever and Magnette collapsed because the liberals in particular – rightly – did not want to simply accept what had been arranged without their input. The opportunity had already been lost.
If the expected/assumed defeat on June 9 becomes reality – and that is a very important ‘if’ – the impact will be great for both N-VA and PS. For the Flemish nationalists, this actually means the end of De Wever’s ‘paradigm’. That is to say: a major, ‘definitive’ state reform, agreed upon by the two opposing power parties in the two parts of the country who agree that they no longer agree and therefore split up as much as possible. Since there are no longer two dominant parties, this becomes difficult.
It also means that in reality the chance is very small that the same Bart De Wever will actually become the next Prime Minister. Mathematically, if his party were to board such a broad coalition, it would still be the largest. But will her community and ideological perspective also be leading? That will be a lot more difficult.
Feathering a chicken
The same goes for Paul Magnette. Over the past ten years, his party has failed to get Wallonia and Brussels on the right track in terms of budgetary and financial economics. Now the financial shortage in French-speaking Belgium is great again, but the classic trade-off ‘more Flemish autonomy for French-speaking refinancing’ threatens to reach a dead end. The federal treasury is also empty. The biggest concern of the next government will therefore be refinancing. Sponsoring a new community deal with federal money would be almost irresponsible.
This does not mean that state reform is not possible. Other parties also have some ideas about this. Even the MR of the convinced Belgian Georges-Louis Bouchez. If something comes of it, it may well be a state reform that follows a more federal logic and that does not just see the federal state as a chicken that you can pimp financially and institutionally at will.
The question will be whether the N-VA is keen on such a scenario. Perhaps the party will then demand ‘a fat fish’ to make government participation palatable. We remember that image from 2010, when Belgium set the world record for government formation. It didn’t work then, and the N-VA was still a rapidly growing political force.
