The squat on Paleizenstraat may be empty, but the ongoing asylum problems are causing great tension within the De Croo government. “It’s open war.”
Lot 10.676: a black printer. Starting price: 5 euros. Lot 10.685: a mint green chair (with some stains). Starting price: 100 euros. Lot 10.699: two white tables. Starting price: 80 euros. Lot 10.683: three blue sofas and a side table. Starting price: 300 euros.
On Friday afternoon, the public sale of part of the contents of Fedasil, the government service responsible for the reception of asylum seekers, started. The proceeds of this online auction will be distributed among asylum seekers with an ongoing penalty.
The sale is a symbolic low point in the particularly difficult weeks that Federal Secretary of State for Asylum Nicole de Moor (cd&v) is going through.
Not everything is her fault. The chaotic evacuation of the squat in the Paleizenstraat, for example, can largely be attributed to Brussels. But it is becoming increasingly difficult to escape the image of a State Secretary who no longer has the asylum file under control. It seems De Moor is growing over his head. And there is hardly any support from her colleagues in the government.
Taboos from the left, taboos from the right
On Friday morning, De Moor presented measures to the government summit – for the twentieth time – to limit the influx of asylum seekers and to increase the outflow of asylum seekers. “We won’t make it with shelter alone”, has been her mantra for some time now. So far without much success. Within the government, the taboos of the right continue to override those of the left, and vice versa. For example, PS and Ecolo do not want to know about (too) hard dissuasion.
Tensions are steadily rising within the federal government. Certainly on the left, people increasingly feel called upon to distance themselves from asylum policy. “We are apparently the last defenders of human rights. If we call it quits, we will leave it to forces that are less concerned with human rights,” says Groen co-chair Jeremie Vaneeckhout in a weekend interview with this newspaper.
Tellingly about the rising tension: Thursday evening the Ministry of Defense, led by Ludivine Dedonder (PS), will release figures about the large number of unoccupied reception places in Belgian barracks. 365 in total. Which immediately raises the question: why were they not used during the evacuation of the Paleizenstraat?
On Friday morning, De Moor sends out a flaming press release that the Ministry of Defense gives a completely wrong representation of the facts. Those places are not ‘free’. “I do not accept the criticism that shelters remain unused,” she writes.
“This was a purely political settlement of the PS,” responds a well-informed source. “It is open war between the governing parties, and it is getting worse. PS still had a bone to pick with the prime minister and De Moor because they criticized Brussels this week.”
Busy
The pressure is also increased from the outside. By the opposition – of course. “That the proceeds of the public sale will be distributed among asylum seekers with an ongoing penalty is a dangerous precedent. Because if that news circulates in Europe, it will undoubtedly create an even greater pull effect to Belgium,” says Member of Parliament Theo Francken (N-VA).
NGOs such as Refugee Work Flanders, Civic Platform, Doctors Without Borders and Doctors of the World emphasize that there are “feasible solutions” for the asylum crisis.
“For example, emergency accommodation in hotels, but also the activation of a mandatory distribution plan for asylum seekers across the 581 municipalities of this country. At the moment there are about 3,000 people on the waiting list for a reception place. If each municipality were to house five asylum seekers, this waiting list would be quickly eliminated,” it says.
