A television from LG, a sofa or some household appliances: on Valentine’s Day, a lot of ‘non-essential’ items were seized at Fedasil, the body that has to arrange the reception of asylum seekers. The federal agency was sentenced last year to pay penalty payments after some asylum seekers went to court because they were denied shelter. Because the government refuses to pay those penalties, the bailiff visited Fedasil to seize some items. Due to the seizures, Fedasil will not have to pay the penalty payments.
But the public sale was not a success. Many items were not even bid once. At least one table has been sold. To Theo Francken, N-VA Member of Parliament and former Secretary of State for Asylum and Migration. He already dubbed the piece of furniture the ‘asylum failure table’. “I bought this table as a reminder of this terrible government with its naive ‘open arms’ asylum policy. I have been following Belgian and European asylum and migration policy for 23 years now. It’s never been this bad. Every time I see that table, it gives me courage to persevere for a paradigm shift to an asylum procedure beyond European borders. Denmark, Great Britain, Italy and the Netherlands are over the bridge. When will our country follow?”
