Extreme right make gains
International Viewpoint #261 November 1994
IN SEPTEMBER Vincent
Scheltiens reported on the rise of the extreme right in both
Flemish and French speaking areas of Belgium. In the recent local elections they made further gains and strengthened previous footholds. One of the only bright spots was the election of local councillors in Antwerp from the Movement for
Socialist Renewal, BSV, which included a member of the
Socialist Workers' Party
(SAP/POS, Belgian section of the Fourth International).
phenomenon in the port city. In the legislative elections of 1991, "Black Sunday" as it has been known since, it took 25% of the vote, becoming the largest party in the city. It has now increased its lead, taking 28% of the vote, and its continuing success is at the expense of social democracy. Since the last local elections in 1988 the SP vote in Antwerp has declined by 8.3%, down to 20.5% today. The party has been complicit in implementing austerity policies, vain attempts to manage the crisis, and aggravation of social inequality -killing any hope for change.
ALAIN TONDEUR sent us the following report.
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B ELGIUM'S local elections on 9 October confirmed and amplified the breakthrough of the extreme right, not only in Flanders and Brussels, but also in Wallonie. The Vlaams Blok, the Front National and AGIR had more than 300 representatives elected to the communal and provincial councils. The Vlaams Blok consolidated itself as the largest party in the Antwerp metropolis, whereas the FN was close on the heels of the traditional bourgeois parties in the industrial region in the south of the country. The breakthrough for the Vlaams Blok in Antwerp is no surprise. In 1987 this fascist party emerged as a worrying
Moreover, the local SP, which has been part of the city's municipal government since the end of the war, remained unaffected by the relatively successful renewal by Flemish social democracy as a whole in the course of the 1980s. The combination of the two factors no doubt has something to do with the fact that the neo-fascists did even better in Antwerp than elsewhere. Stronghold Today, Antwerp is the capital of the Vlaams Blok. Starting from this stronghold, it is spreading out across the whole of Flanders and the stain gets bigger with each election. The Blok is above its Flemish average (10.9%) throughout the province of Antwerp but also in Gand, the second city of Flanders (13.3%). Until now it had not succeeded in breaking through at Limbourg, where anti-racist sentiment was well rooted in the community of mineworkers. Henceforth it can have high hopes, as the government has decided to close the pits and the Blok, like all similar parties, follows in the tracks of unemployment.
International Viewpoint #261 November 1994
Antwerp is not a town like the others; it is the biggest urban concentration in Flanders, an important industrial centre and a port which serves a hinterland going well beyond Belgium. The bourgeoisie has always preferred class collaboration in order to manage the city, and the chamber of commerce did not hide its hostility to the Vlaams Blok in the course of the campaign. Traditional parties swore to establish a "cordon sanitaire" around the Blok -without success. The dominant class is not on the point of changing this policy but a coalition of three traditional "families" is hardly sufficient to stop the fascists from participating in the communal government. With the Greens
(AGALEV) the majority would be more comfortable, but they are not seen as a viable partner by the ruling class. Moreover, three of the seven Green deputies are in fact "Red-Green" (see below).
Questions
Many questions remain unanswered. The worst outcome for sure would be that the Blok succeeds in presenting itself as the sole opposition force in Antwerp in the coming years. If that happens, the fascists would not be slow in breaking through to new "heights".
The situation is no more comforting in Wallonie and
Brussels. The 10 communes of
Brussels elected 47 fascist municipal councillors. The FN received its highest score (16.6%) in Molenbeek, a working class area of the capital. However, the Front National and AGIR had confirmed their breakthrough in Frenchspeaking Belgium at the European elections earlier this year. The vote for these two rival formations in June was no bout of tever, and nobody can now deny it. On the contrary, the red regions of Wallonie are little by little being covered by ugly stains, with the Front National and AGIR registering scores of just over 10% (14.4% at La Louvière). As in Flanders, it is clearly those disappointed by social democracy who are passing to the extreme right. The phenomenon is most evident in the localities where the PS has been the dominant party for a long time. At Charleroi, Seriang, La Louvière and a good deal of other workers' towns, the gains of the extreme right corresponded almost exactly to the losses of the social democrats. Moreover, a survey carried out after the election indicates that the PS electorate is more susceptible to racist crusades than the ecologist electorate — obviously - but also the Christian electorate;
only 35% of SP voters think that foreigners born in Belgium should have the right to vote in local elections.
Observer
Against this sombre background, the progressive observer will be somewhat cheered by the election of three members of the BSV, the
Movement for Social Renewal, who were candidates on the list of the ecologist party at Antwerp.
These were Patsy Sorensen, outgoing local councillor and SP dissident, founder of the BSV and a very well known personality because of her fight against the treatment of prostitutes, Nadine Peeters, a member of the SAP (Belgian section of the Fourth International) and leader of a high school students organisation (AJOKAR), which has organised several school strikes against fascism and racism; and Lou Weyns, a combative trade unionist who works in chemicals. Their presence on the green list with five other members of the BSV was the result of an appeal for BSV-Agalev unity launched by a number of progressive personalities. The Francophone left, on the contrary, enjoyed hardly any success in these elections. The
"United Left" movement ran lists in nine localities. In six cases the score was below its result in the European elections. There was only one candidate elected, in a small provincial town. The threat of the far right created new pressure for a useful vote. There remains an electoral space for the left but to occupy it, it must, without losing its identity, be able to link up with wider currents and demonstrate that a vote for the left will not be a lost vote. ©
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