All good things come to those who are patient

In our last blog, we explained that there were two scenarios. The better one was that after the political exploration of Bart De Wever Elio Di Rupo would take over to start negotiations. The worse one was that someone else had to take over and make more preparations before negotiations could be started.

King Albert II decided to mix the two. Last week, he appointed Elio Di Rupo as 'preformateur'. This title is new. It suggests that it is not possible to start negotiations right now, but Di Rupo has to prepare them. When that job is done, Di Rupo will get a promotion and become formateur.

Words

Words are important in politics, so a little explanation can be useful. Why this odd title? First of all, it seems that the king and his advisors wanted to avoid the titles they gave the senior politicians that had to find a solution for the political crisis after the elections of 2007. No one wants a sequel of what happened then.

The second reason is that the elections were clear. There are only two men in charge: Bart De Wever in Flanders and Elio Di Rupo in the French speaking part of the country. That's why no one else can be in charge now, even if it is too soon to start negotiations.

Not given up

But words are not everything.If you try to take a closer look at the reality behind them, it seems that not much has changed. In a rare press conference last week Mr. De Wever said there were some 'convergences' between him and Elio Di Rupo, but not enough. He also said it is necessary to try and find these convergences.

As long as Di Rupo remains silent, it seems that this is still the situation today: there are not enough 'convergences' between Mr. Di Rupo and Mr. De Wever, but they have not given up searching for them. All good things come to those who are patient.

Bart Haeck