Flanders wants to enter into agreements without Wallonia

Wallonia is blocking various investment agreements that Belgium and Luxembourg want to enter into with other countries. Flemish Minister-President Geert Bourgeois is now taking a leap forward and proposing simply entering into those agreements without Wallonia. “That is Confederalism If we want to make structural changes, then we have to change the structures. Confederalism is the structural change that this country needs. The basic principle of confederalism is that Flanders and Wallonia are the owners of all powers. They exercise these themselves, but can also make decisions together and manage certain powers together at the confederal level, in both of their interests. This completely reverses the logic. Instead of transferring federal powers to Flanders and Wallonia, these powers can be transferred to the confederal level. Forced cooperation is replaced by voluntary cooperation. Must becomes will. Dismantling from above becomes building up from below. Confederalism is therefore deciding together on what we want to do together. confederalism in practice: working together because we want to and because it makes things better for us,” says Flemish MP Karl Vanlouwe. He is advocating a “coalition of the willing” of partners who are interested in progress.

Via the Belgium-Luxembourg Economic Union (BLEU), Flanders is entering into bilateral investment agreements with third countries. However, because Wallonia opposes them, the agreements are blocked. “That has serious consequences, not least for our Flemish dredging companies active in Panama,” says the Minister-President. Luxembourg has already decided not to let Wallonia block it any longer and has decided to enter into agreements on its own without Belgium.

Flanders will not let itself be blocked any longer

Now Geert Bourgeois is also proposing approving the so-called BLEU agreements with Flanders, the federal government and Luxembourg, but without the other Belgian federal entities. If they want to sign up at a later date, they will be able to at any time of course. “But when cooperation turns out to be impossible, every federal entity must be able to do its own thing, without being blocked or held back,” says Karl Vanlouwe. “The whole recent saga regarding CETA, the trade and investment agreement with Canada, showed that we must urgently transition to new ways of working together.”