Belgian Government Collapses
By GulfStreamBlues on Tuesday, July 15 2008, 11:53 - Permalink
Here we go again. Last night the Belgian government collapsed, just
four months after it was formed
in March. Before then, the nation had been without a government for nine months
while the French- and Dutch-speaking parties were unable to form a unity
government.
Belgium’s King Albert II is considering the resignation, but
he doesn’t really have much leeway to block it. The prime minister of the
four-month-old coalition government, Yves Leterme, had set a deadline of July 15
for getting an agreement on devolving more power to the regions. Belgium is made
up of Dutch-speaking Flanders in the North, French-speaking Wallonia in the
South and Brussels, which is French-speaking but located within Flanders. The
Flemish, who are wealthier, want more local power, but the Walloons are
resisting this because it would marginalize their influence.
With this collapse, the country looks closer than it ever has to breaking up. In addition to having no government, the country is now seeing the fastest inflation in 24 years and rapidly slowing economic growth. With the collapse having been technically over something quite minor – the splitting up of a small bilingual voting district called Brussels-Halle-Vilvoorde – it’s hard to see how the country is going to be able to resolve this impasse. But if the country does split up, the question remains: what will happen to Brussels?
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