King Philip has appointed Egbert Lachaert, the new president of the Flemish liberals, to seek an outcome for the Belgian government formation, today in its 448th day. He received no official title, and will report on the 28th of August. The days of the still present government Wilmès II seem now numbered.
King Philip started his consultations on his return from holiday on Monday morning. Until Tuesday noon he spoke to all party presidents, except those of the extreme left and the extreme right. Then Tuesday afternoon at about 3 pm the palace announced that the King had accepted the resignation of Bart De Wever and Paul Magnette and had appointed Lachaert to take ‘the necessary initiatives with the aim of forming a government with a wide majority in parliament”.
Lachaert received no official title for his mission. Indeed there is officially still a government with a working parliamentary majority: the government of Sophie Wilmès, that is composed of the two liberal parties and the Flemish Christian democrats. This was a caretaking minority government from 18 December 2018 until 15 March 2020. It then obtained the support of a majority of parliament to combat the corona-crisis. It will face a confidence vote on 17 September, when parliament returns.
As both socialist parties and the Flemish nationalists have indicated they will vote against her government, they have, together with the two extremes, a majority of 83 votes. There is no doubt that this number is sufficient to topple the government, but there are some ambiguities in the constitution. If Wilmès hands in her resignation before a vote, parliament is obliged to vote for new elections to prevent her of staying on indefinitely as caretaker government.
King Philip took back the initiative that he has to form a government on 20 July after some, in the end rather confusing attempts were made outside the normal procedure via the Palace. The argument was that the king’s role is limited to periods when there is only a caretaking government.
Egbert Lachaert is 41, from Merelbeke in the province of Eastern Flanders. He was elected in the federal parliament in 2014, became group leader of Open VLD (the Flemish liberals) in July 2019 and was elected party president with a large majority on 22 May this year.
The last few days he has widely been blamed for the failure of the attempt of Bart De Wever and Paul Magnette to form a government based on the two largest parties in each region. Indeed the Flemish liberals have been internally divided and constantly wavering, including Lachaert himself, on the course to follow ever since the aftermath of the elections of 26 May 2019.
Lachaert replied that it was the inflexibility of De Wever and Magnette that caused the failure. It is not unusual for the palace to send out the person who is perceived to have killed the previous attempt. The new negotiator announced on Tuesday afternoon that he will work in all discretion.
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