Trainer Bart De Wever (N-VA) asked the Flemish liberals of Open Vld to participate in negotiations with a view to forming a federal government, announces the VRT.
The trainer is expected at the Palace next Tuesday. The King is holding his resignation presented on Monday under advisement and has asked him to conduct additional consultations. The objective is to check whether the Arizona formula with the N-VA, the MR, Les Engagés, Vooruit and the CD&V can be put back on track, while the Flemish socialists do not intend to negotiate on the basis of the socio-economic note by Bart De Wever.
The idea of replacing the Flemish socialists with the Open Vld has been circulating since then. This coalition would only have 76 seats out of 150 in the House and does not have a majority in the Dutch linguistic group.
On Wednesday, the group leader in the Flemish parliament and former party president Egbert Lachaert suggested that no official invitation had been sent to them. This would have arrived in the meantime. The information was confirmed unofficially by several sources.
In the trainer’s entourage, we want to remain discreet. On the side of the Flemish liberals, the decision whether or not to join the federal government has not yet been made. Even if the lead is not yet concrete, the hypothesis is “seriously examined”, says a source.
The Open VLD accepted the invitation
The president of the Open Vld Eva De Bleeker accepted the invitation of trainer Bart De Wever for an interview, she indicated on Thursday on the X network.We will discuss the content of our conversation internally“, she added.
The MR and the CD&V do not agree
A coalition bringing together the N-VA, the MR, the Engagés, the CD&V and the Open Vld would, however, only have 76 seats out of 150 in the Chamber. “A majority that only holds one seat, and without a Flemish majority in addition, at a time when we have to carry out extremely important reforms, that is not right, it gives the possibility to each of the 76 deputies to play the ‘shadow ‘ Prime Ministers“, warned the president of the CD&V, Sammy Mahdi.
The Christian Democrats still favor Arizona, the coalition bringing together the N-VA, the MR, the Engagés, Vooruit and the CD&V. This formula is possible, according to them, if everyone puts water in their wine. The CD&V also has objections and remarks about the trainer’s socio-economic score, the subject of the dispute between the Arizona partners. The trainer “said the cursor could still move“, affirmed Mr. Mahdi.
The MR for his part judges that there is no more time to lose. “Today there is an emergency, we have to make a budget. Either Vooruit stops his games and comes to the negotiating table, or we will have to do without them. But now we have to do it and do it quickly. It’s either Arizona or with the VLD. The rest is not possible“, underlined the president, Georges-Louis Bouchez.
Even if this situation would not be comfortable, it is possible in the eyes of the French-speaking liberals to constitute a majority holding only one seat. “This has already existed and in this formula there is no other possible majority unless we look for the PTB and the Vlaams Belang, which is not realistic“, remarked Mr. Bouchez.
formation of a federal government open vld vooruit De Wever
