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Friday 18 July 2008

BROKEN BELGIUM

The long running saga of who governs Belgium is continuing.
A couple of days ago the Belgian Prime Minister, Yves Leterme, tendered his resignation to the King after failing to reconcile differences between Belgium's French and Flemish speaking communities.

Belgium's Federal elections in June last year plunged the country into crisis when none of the political parties could agree on a coalition - this left the country effectively without a government for nine months. Leterme formed a government back in March but this now seems to have broken down. People are again talking about whether Belgium will split and what would happen to Brussels.

You might be interested to read these articles on what might happen next:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/7512975.stm

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/58595e74-5399-11dd-8dd2-000077b07658.html?nclick_check=1

You might also be interested to read of this prank in late 2006 when the Belgian state broadcaster ran a spoof news programme reporting that the country had split.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/6178671.stm

A case of life imitating art perhaps?

1 comment:

Merseymike said...

Perhaps more worrying is that the country appeared to bob among quite nicely without a government!

Musty say that it did rekindle a few of those anarchist slogans...'it doesn't matter who you vote for, the Government always gets in!'