In Tervuren, only two out of 108 candidates have a decent chance of grabbing the job of mayor, worth €100,000 per year. The kingmakers are not really Tervuren’s 14,305 registered voters. It’s Groen’s top politicians that are most likely to have the major hand in choosing the mayor once again.
Even if coming second, the Flemish nationalist N-VA still stands a chance of being chosen to supply the mayor as it was in 2012 and 2018. Strict on language and Flemish identity, incumbent mayor N-VA Marc Charlier, an insurance and risk manager, should benefit from the votes of local Vlaams Belang supporters, potentially claiming 28-30% of the vote. That pushes the N-VA to 8, or if lucky 9, out of the 27 council seats.
But a successful mayoral candidate will need 14 seats to secure the €100,000 mayor’s ribbon. Cleverly, Flemish liberal Thomas Geyns joined forces with the Flemish Catholics to form “Voor Tervuren”. Well funded, ambitious and active, Geyns appears to have placed more posters of himself in Tervuren than any other candidate. And Geyns’ Voor Tervuren could gain 9-10 seats, on the basis 30-32% of the vote. That should give Geyns the right of initiative to convince Groen’s top candidates to choose him as major as part of a Voor Tervuren-Groen coalition.
Will Groen choose a Flemish nationalist again?
Politics is never just math. Both Geyns and Charlier theoretically have a path to becoming mayor. That entails offering Groen’s top politicians at least 2 out of 7 alderperson posts, worth €60,000 each per year. After the 2012 and 2018 elections, Groen chose to give N-VA the mayoral post. Ideology and policies then appeared secondary, but not negligible factors. And don’t forget: mayors and alderpersons in Tervuren tend to keep their second jobs.
Personality is another factor. Despite differences, Groen has worked with N-VA mayors in coalition for over a decade without mayor hiccups. To secure Groen’s top candidates’ support, Flemish liberal Geyns, a lawyer, specialized in planning law*, will need to convince Groen that there will be no acrimonious relations relations till the end of office in 2030.
Geyns recently alluded to the “intellectual dishonesty” of Groen’s top candidate, and current alderman Bram Peters. in a council debate. Another notable outburst was in 2019 when he called out the N-VA for undermining Tervuren’s Dutch-speaking identity by appointing a French-speaking councilor to a cultural committee.
[Editorial note by author Dafydd ab Iago: following an allegation of slander and libel by Thomas Geyns, I now use the function description “lawyer, specialized in planning law”.]
On the sidelines are Tervuren Unie and Volt. Tervuren’s Flemish politicians make it clear they will not collaborate with Tervuren Unie’s councilors, judged too French-speaking and not supportive of the town’s strict Dutch-only language policy.
And Tervuren Unie’s partner, Volt Tervuren, a local branch of the European movement, also faces hurdles. Just under half of the town’s 44% electorate of non-Belgian origin is not even registered for the elections. That’s some 2,928 potential non-Belgian voters — around 20% of Tervuren’s electorate — who can’t vote on Sunday 13 October.
WARNING: This article is about local politics. The author, Dafydd ab Iago, is a professional journalist and a candidate for Tervuren’s town council, running for European movement Volt Europa’s Tervuren branch.
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