Belgium Divided

Back


April 2008
The nation's politicians are bickering over an issue that's plagued the country since its creation in 1830: how do you reconcile the French speaking Walloons in the south and the Dutch speaking Flemish in the north? How can you have national co-operation when the people who make up the nation don't share a common language let alone read the same newspapers, watch the same television or vote for the same politicians?

Asked "What is Belgium actually for?" those on the Flemish far right have a devastating answer. "Belgium in my opinion is an occupier, because basically it was created to let the French culture dominate the Dutch culture, so in my opinion it's an occupier." That's the opinion of the new leader of the Flemish far-right, Bruno Valkeniers.

The conflict even intrudes into the celebrity show biz media.

Minutes after being crowned Miss Belgium, Alizee Poulicek, a French speaker, stepped out of the pages of a fashion magazine and into the fire of the separatist debate. Asked an innocuous question in Flemish (Dutch), she was unable to reply. Booed by the crowd she was pilloried by the Dutch language press as being representative of the arrogance displayed by French speaking Belgians.

Ms Poulicek has seen the linguistic light and confides in Epstein that actually she's very keen, "to learn Dutch and to do a lot of things on the Dutch side of the country and with Dutch people... and I have to do my best to try to speak Dutch."

Channel: News & Politics
Uploaded: April 28, 2008 at 8:55 am
Author: journeymanpictures

Length: 00:28:05
Rating: 4.61
Views: 9948

Tags: Belgium French Flemish Journeyman Pictures

Embed Code:


Video Comments:
mikeverm (December 2, 2008 at 2:20 pm)
1:40 the most stupid walloon they could have ever asked, and i am flemish and not a seperatist
wodanbruel (November 2, 2008 at 10:28 am)
voor de chocalade!
wodanbruel (November 2, 2008 at 10:04 am)
akkoord
wodanbruel (November 2, 2008 at 10:03 am)
de waarheid doet pijn he jonge!
Globalvisit (October 27, 2008 at 2:38 pm)
TiredEBE your are realy tired.. go sleep your stupid mind of life
Globalvisit (October 27, 2008 at 2:33 pm)
TiredEBE you speak about respect.. your are a fanatic ?
Fortunately, not everyone follow this indoctrination, very similar of that suffered by some people of Arabia country using the religious culture to validate intolerable acts. You use culture money and language.. for your indoctrination ! i can't validate your malevolent behavior.
Globalvisit (October 27, 2008 at 2:10 pm)
eXowomb you invoke money but it's not the reel reason of your problem with "tipycal francophone" sometimes we must accept to have moore or have less, if i listen you, when Flamingos will have finished with walloon, Antwerp attack Mechelen cause they have moore money ! you'r crazy men
Your attitude is based on old frustrations of cultural rejection having any longer reason to be today.. The ultimate stupidity is not to take lessons of our mistakes. i think u'r a king for mistakes reproducion
Globalvisit (October 27, 2008 at 1:41 pm)
eXowomb,
first compare this media before says stupid thing ;)
Globalvisit (October 27, 2008 at 1:24 pm)
Im French and I agree with TinoBabs on certain points.
TinoBabs you say : SOME (I insite on the SOME) Flemish communities allow the vote for political parties in Wallonia.
Globalvisit (October 27, 2008 at 1:28 pm)
I think we should have the right to vote for who we want but only if the elected party respects the language of each subjects, Dutch, German or French and if the administration communicate with him in a language he has chosen.
A new government structure should be established to have control over the destination of taxes from all Belgian people and personally I favorise the government to publish all the account seamlessly on the Web so all taxpayer can see what they do with our money!