Few people and enthusiasm on IJzer Pilgrimage

thusiastically the new Purple government was received in the Flemish press, concludes Knack (3 September). The contrast with the credit accorded the Purple-Green government when it came to power in 1999 is great. The unwritten rule that a new government is given the benefit of the doubt and the first few months are overlooked before any conclusions are drawn suddenly appeared to no longer apply. As early as July resentment reared its head in the press when the Federal Government was sworn in. Was this to do with the abandonment of the Genocide Act, the prostration before the Americans? With the fact that the Nationale Bank only published its poor economic figures after the elections? Or did the large number of new excellencies whose main task consists of securing a place in the public eye with a view to on next year’s regional elections play a part, the weekly magazine asks. Political talent is scarce, was the word at party headquarters, and must be used everywhere. To the reasons for this resentment we can add: the vision of ‘governing’ on the other side of the linguistic border. This week Flemish newspaper commentators pulled out all the stops again when Civil Service Minister Marie Arena (PS) consigned the Copernicus reform of the federal administration of her Flemish predecessor Luc Vanden Bossche (SP.A) to the waste bin in the French-language newspaper Le Soir. The Minister wants to put an end to a reform that pays top civil servants far too much, spent a fortune on private consultancy and assessments by private selection agencies and with which 80,000 federal civil servants are in their own words fed up. And yet a similar reform to create greater efficiency and better service also implemented by Vanden Bossche – succeeded in the Flemish administration. According to De Standaard (4 september), by doing this the Minister is giving out the message that the administration is there for itself, not to serve the people and that the PS again wants to continue its political appointments in the civil service via the public recruitment service. Although Arena subsequently qualified all this and Premier Verhofstadt minimised her comments to ‘adjustments’ that could be found in the coalition agreement, De Morgen (4 September) cannot get rid of the impression that the reform was buried. Yet more evidence that Flanders and Wallonia are two different worlds, says the paper. fo cu s s ur la ndre • fcus on f l a n d e r s • f o k u s a u f f l a n d e r n • INTRODUCTION