Brussels government in crisis as cdH walks out

Benoît Lutgen, cdH president, said that PS had a “crushing responsibility” for the scandals. “Politics must serve, not serve itself,” he said. “Every scandal is a new handicap for the work of this government.”

Vice minister-president Maxime Prévot of cdH said that his party did not want to leave the government but rather find a new partner. “We will not go on with PS,” he said. “We can’t work together with them anymore. It is time for a new, more modern, more voluntary policy.”

Last week, Brussels-City mayor Yvan Mayeur, of PS, resigned after he was found to have received substantial board attendance fees from the capital’s homeless agency Samusocial. This followed the scandal that broke late last year over energy distributor Publifin. PS politicians sitting on the board of the intercommunal apparently received payments for meetings they never attended, a similar situation to Samusocial.

PS and cdH have governed together in Brussels and Wallonia since 2004. The current Brussels coalition government is made up of the pair, plus French-speaking FDF and Flemish parties Open Vld, SP.A and CD&V.

Lutgen is now talking to several other French-speaking parties to form a new coalition in both the capital region and Wallonia.

PS released a short statement saying that the move by cdH is a “betrayal” and that it was behaving irresponsibly. It also said that various parties were involved in the “affairs” and that it has taken steps to “restore citizens’ trust in the democratic institutions”.

At the federal level, both prime minister Charles Michel (MR) and N-VA president Bart De Wever stated that nothing would change. Michel said the federal government would continue with its four parties (NVA, MR, CD&V and Open VLD) while De Wever said there were no repercussions at the federal level from the events in the French-speaking political landscape.    

Photo courtesy Brigitte Grouwels