So how did Belgium end up with two kingmakers?
The only commonplace that the Belgian pollsters got right this time is that in every election there is a surprise. Just not the one they were predicting.
In Flanders, Bart De Wever of the Flemish Conservative Regionalists of N-VA held off the predicted surge of the far right party Vlaams Belang and managed to remain (in extremis) the biggest party. In Wallonia, the decade long grip on power of the Walloon socialist party PS has been broken by the centre-right forces of the Liberals of the MR and the centrists of Les Engagés as both parties registered historic victories beyond expectations. For the first time ever the liberals are overtaking the socialists in French-speaking Belgium, while a reborn Les Engagés managed to rise from their ashes after their obliteration in 2019.
Other parties that did well are the Flemish Socialists of Vooruit, whose former leader Connor Rousseau has been vindicated by the voters after his troubles of last year. He is now clearly back in a position to play once again an important role at the centre of Belgian politics. The significant gains of the Communists of PTB-PVDA in Flanders and especially in Brussels are slightly tarnished by an unexpected loss in Wallonia. Despite their overall progress in the country nobody seems to be looking at them as potential coalition partner in any of the governments.
So Who lost?
On the Flemish side Vlaams Belang won a lot of votes and seats, but did not manage to surpass their historical best result from 2004 and become the biggest party in Flanders. Despite their strong scores this situation leaves them emptyhanded: they cannot claim the lead in any government negotiations and, more importantly, none of the other parties displays any intention of breaking them out of the (in)famous “cordon sanitaire”, condemning them in all likelihood to another five years of isolation and opposition.
Sitting prime minister Alexander De Croo and his Flemish Liberals of Open VLD lost on all fronts. The entire party leadership has already resigned and the general tone within the party is a preference to rebuild the party from the opposition benches.
Also the Greens from Ecolo and Groen! scored quite poorly and will take their time for self-reflection and reinvention with the exception of the Brussels regional government where they will probably be needed to form a majority.
Finally, the Flemish Christian Democrats of CD&V lost votes and seats, but have outperformed their own fears and expectations. Since their new party leader Sammy Mahdi took over two years ago at an all-time low in the polls, the party feels a renewed momentum and is looking confident at the upcoming negotiations convinced that they will be part of any puzzle the negotiators will end up solving.
So What will happen next?
That will very much depend on the two politicians the Belgian voters crowned king makers: Bart De Wever of N-VA and Georges-Louis Bouchez of MR. They will take the initiative in the coming days to try to cash in on their electoral successes and rapidly start talks for the formation of the regional governments at Flemish, Walloon / French Speaking Community and Brussels level. The N-VA and the MR are virtually “incountournable” in their respective geographies, leaving little room for many different coalition scenarios when excluding the far right and the far left. Whereas the task might look quite straightforward in Flanders and Wallonia, Belgium would not be Belgium if at least the task in the Brussels Region looks, to put it mildly, “challenging”, needing majorities in both linguistic groups with the relationship status between several leading parties firmly set to “it’s complicated”. Also the German-speaking community will need to form a new government, but that is unlikely to have any impact on the rest of the negotiations or to stop the fundamental momentum.
The Belgian King has started consulting with the party leaders to decide what should happen next at federal level, but it seems unavoidable that the logical conclusion will be that eventually either Bouchez or De Wever will be given the first opportunity to try to negotiate a government.
So What About the famous reform of state?
For the moment the priority of MR, N-VA and most winning parties seems to be the rapid formation of government with a socio-economic agenda to reform the pension and tax systems, bring the government deficits back on track and change the labor market. The always complex process of reform of the state, reallocating the competencies between the federal and regional level, will probably have to wait. It also needs a 2/3 majority, which will demand some of the losing parties of this elections to be convinced at a certain stage. But it is not off the table completely, as N-VA wants to see clear progress within two years.
So What can we conclude at this stage?
Many are already alluding to the mathematically most obvious coalitions at regional level: N-VA, Vooruit and CD&V in Flanders and MR and Les Engagés in Wallonia. If that realizes, an agreement between the same parties could also prove the winning formula at Federal level. So instead of breaking the world record for longest government formation which the Belgians still hold, things could go much quicker now. But that is speculation, and as Belgian pollsters can tell you – this is Belgium, it is dangerous to make predictions.
Pierre Deraedt, June 2024