EUROPEAN DIARY:One linguistically spilt EU hub in search of a stable government looks set for further stalemate, writes Jamie Smyth
WHAT A difference a year makes. Travelling home to Ireland for the holidays it was hard to avoid depressing conversations about falling house prices and the threat of job losses over the turkey dinner. And while the previous New Year was marked by Celtic Tiger-style rugby scrums in expensive shops, this year it was even possible to push a baby buggy relatively safely around Brown Thomas on the opening day of the sales.
But any thought of escaping the gloomy mood on arriving back in Brussels was quickly dispelled, with Belgian newspapers and commentators in an even more pessimistic mindset than their Irish counterparts. The banking crisis, a recession, a smog alert and the collapse of the country's third government in 12 months were the main talking points in a holiday season marked by emergency parliamentary sessions rather than champagne.
"On to the next one, and fast!" screamed the headline in French-speaking daily Le Soir on the demise of Yves Leterme, who resigned as prime minister just before Christmas over the "Fortisgate" affair.
The leader of the Flemish Christian Democrats was accused of trying to influence an appeals court ruling on the right of shareholders in the Belgian insurer Fortis to block a state plan to sell it to French bank BNP Paribas. A Belgian judge said he had "strong indications" but no legal proof that Leterme's aides tried to influence the court. Given the constitutional protection for the separation of powers, Leterme had no alternative but to tender his resignation. His Flemish Christian Democrat colleague Herman van Rompuy replaced him as prime minister.
Losing one prime minister may be considered unlucky, but losing two smacks of carelessness and Belgium's political fragility over the past 18 months does not auger well for its ability to meet the tough economic challenges that lie ahead. At the root of the problem is a deep split between the country's two big linguistic communities, the Dutch-speaking majority living mainly in Flanders and the Francophone minority in Wallonia.
Despite winning a landslide victory in the June 2007 election, Leterme was unable to cobble together a government for nine months due to a standoff with Francophone political parties over his plan to devolve more powers to the regions. In the end, he temporarily shelved his election pledge to give Flanders more autonomy over taxes, labour market policy and healthcare spending to persuade two Francophone political parties to join a five-party coalition.
Francophone parties fear any further devolution of power could threaten the flow of subsidies from the richer, Flemish-speaking north to the poorer region of Wallonia.
The elevation of van Rompuy to the prime ministership will not solve this fundamental problem, which could threaten to undermine the long-term viability of Belgium as a united country.
"It is important that intercommunal dialogue be relaunched and achieve results ahead of regional elections ," van Rompuy told parliament last week.
But his plan to set up an experts group to come up with ideas to resolve the crisis before the summer sounds remarkably similar to a committee of wise men appointed by Leterme last year to find a solution. This report, published last July, failed to break the stalemate between the two language communities.
Van Rompuy will also have to cope with a debilitating recession, the legal injunction preventing the government's planned sale of Fortis and a parliamentary inquiry into the "Fortisgate" affair. The challenges are immense, so it is little wonder Belgians are as downbeat as the Irish about politics and the economy. But if there is any silver lining to the recent political upheaval in Belgium, it probably rests on Leterme's downfall.
The gaffe-prone former leader, who forgot the national anthem on live TV and once described Belgium as "an accident of history", was deeply unpopular with French speakers.
Van Rompuy is a less flamboyant and a much more cautious politician than Leterme. The bespectacled 61-year-old economist worked at the Belgian central bank before entering politics. He is credited with driving down Belgium's ballooning budget deficit when he served as budget minister between 1993 and 1999.
"He has a lot of experience when it comes to delivering state reforms and is trusted more by French speakers than Leterme. This gives him more legitimacy in that part of the country," says Carl Devos, professor of political science at Ghent University, who notes the public are sick and tired of political squabbling.
Whether his reputation can help to deliver a viable state reform before the June elections remains to be seen. But with the public mood darkening in Belgium, there is a danger the ongoing political stalemate will result in a victory for separatist parties, a situation that would make it more difficult to negotiate reforms in the future.