Bart De Wever

Biography

Born in Mortsel, De Wever attended the Katholieke Universiteit Leuven (KUL), graduating with a licentiate (equivalent of the master's degree) in History. As a student he was a member of the Liberaal Vlaams Studentenverbond (LVSV, Liberal Flemish Students' Union), the Katholiek Vlaams Hoogstudentenverbond (KVHV, Catholic Flemish Students' Union) of Antwerp and Leuven. He is a former editor-in-chief of the KVHV newspapers Tegenstroom (magazine of KVHV in Antwerp) and Ons Leven (in Leuven).

He was employed as a research assistant working on the Nieuwe Encyclopedie van de Vlaamse Beweging (New Encyclopedia of the Flemish Movement). In 2004, he was elected as president of the N-VA with 95% of the votes. He was the only candidate that stood for the election.

De Wever went through a rough stretch in 2006 when he accepted the conservative-liberal Jean-Marie Dedecker as an N-VA member, causing a split with the CD&V party. In order to reconcile the party, Dedecker had to leave. Although he was extensively criticised, the local N-VA leaders permitted De Wever to remain as N-VA president.

In the 2009 regional elections, his party won an unexpectedly high 13% of the votes, making N-VA the overall winner of the elections together with old cartel partner CD&V. N-VA subsequently joined the government, with De Wever choosing to remain party president and appointing two other party members as ministers in the Flemish Government and one party member as speaker of the Flemish Parliament.

Under his presidency his party gained around 30% of the votes in Flanders during federal elections held on June 13, 2010. De Wever himself won the most preference votes of the Dutch-speaking region (nearly 800,000).

De Wever has visited British Prime Minister David Cameron at 10 Downing Street on a number of occasions.

He is an avowed admirer of Edmund Burke and of his political philosophy.

The historian Bruno de Wever is his older brother.

Political career

Member of the district council of Berchem (1996–1997)

Member of the Flemish Parliament. (2004–2007)

President of N-VA (2004- )

Representative (2007- )

Member of Antwerp municipal council (2007- )

Mayor of Antwerp (2013- )

2010 Belgian Federal Election

An early election was held on 13 June 2010, resulting in the N-VA winning most votes in the Dutch-speaking areas and the Socialist Party (PS) in French-speaking Belgium. Nationally the two parties were almost even with 27 seats for the N-VA and 26 for the PS, the remaining seats being split between ten other parties. For 541 days after the elections, no agreement could be reached among the parties on a coalition to form a new government and during that period the country continued to be governed by an interim government. On 6 December 2011 the Di Rupo I Government was sworn in. De Wever and the N-VA were not included in the makeup of this government.

Regarding the May 25, 2014 federal election, PS party leader Elio Di Rupo noted that his party will be unwilling to enter into a dialogue with De Wever and the N-VA regarding forming a new federal government.

Controversies

In 1996, he was photographed attending a conference held by the French extreme-right Front National leader Jean-Marie Le Pen. De Wever justified his attendance by arguing that "in a democracy everyone should have the right to express his opinion, even if it's an opinion I detest. And I always prefer to get my information first hand than to get it in a filtered way."

In October 2007, in reaction to the apology of the Mayor of Antwerp for his city's collaboration in the deportation of Jews during World War II, Bart De Wever said that:

"Antwerp did not organise the deportation of the Jews, it was the victim of Nazi occupation ... Those who were in power at the time had to take tricky decisions in difficult times. I don't find it very courageous to stigmatise them now."

He later issued an apology to representatives of Antwerp's Jewish community. Following these events, in an op-ed published in Le Monde, the Belgian French-speaking writer Pierre Mertens claimed that Bart De Wever was a "convinced negationist leader". De Wever sued Mertens for this allegation.

In July 2016, he called Angela Merkel personally responsible for the "mess she has herself created" in relation to the 2016 terrorist attacks in Germany. On the radio channel Radio 1, he claimed that Angela Merkel should have led a European military coalition against IS in 2015, that she was not a true leader, and insinuated that she could have partially prevented the attacks. De Wever was criticized for this by the leader of the SP.A, John Crombez, who said to be ashamed for the claim that Merkel would be the cause of the "great problems in Europe". De Wever's remarks were also countered by other Belgian politicians, as well as by a Flemish journalist. De Wever also claimed that Merkel has caused the rise of Donald Trump, Geert Wilders and Marine Le Pen.

Death threats and illness

In December 2013, the Belgian newspaper Het Laatste Nieuws received a bullet in the post with a letter addressed to Bart De Wever, apparently from a communist extremist. De Wever received police protection.

In November 2013, De Wever was admitted to hospital with severe anxiety and chest pains. He was readmitted into an intensive care unit in February 2014 with a severe lung infection.

Panda suits

In March 2014, Bart De Wever made a live appearance at the Flemish television awards, dressed in a Panda suit; a reference to a decision by the Di Rupo government to import two pandas at a cost per panda greater than the legal maximum director's salary in Belgium. Nevertheless, because those pandas are initially gifts from the People's Republic of China, it would be impolite to refuse them. They are also cost-effective in the short term.