Belgium 1 year without goverment

[River 128,694]

2 minutes ago, Varys said:

From all the western countries we might have the most complex political structure.

You should know that we have 3 official languages. Dutch spoken in the norh in Flanders (Flanders is the richest part of Belgium (like nordic european countries)  were 60% of our 11 million population lives). Then you have French spoken in Wallonia (a more poor region like Southern Europe type) (were 35% lives) But in wallonia you also have a German comminity of 30.000 speakers which is also an official language. Finnaly we have the Brussels capital region of 1,5 million people were both French and Dutch are official languages but also lots people speak english because of the EU headquarters and Nato Headquarters. 

Each of these language groups have a seperate goverment which has equal power as the federal goverment. (So a Dutch,French and German goverment) But it doesn't end there. Wallonia Brussels And Flanders also have seperate goverments with equal power. Because Flanders and the Dutch region are the same its one gov but wallonia and french speaking are 2 different goverments. So we have 6 goverments in total (Federal, French, Wallonia, Brussels, German and Flemish/Dutch) + a king. Wallonia and Brussels voted (socialist/green communist) and Flanders voted (Conservative/Seperatist/Liberal/Green). A large minority of Flanders (around 20%) wants to seperate from Belgium since we broke of from the netherlands  in 1830 (some want to rejoin the netherlands btw) .  First until after WW2 it was because the French speaking persons and Elites saw the Dutch speaking majority has peasants and discriminated against them .  Then after WW2 Flanders became the economic powerhouse of Belgium and Wallonia became depented on it.  So now the 2 sides have to come together but because when you live in Flanders you only can vote for Flemish parties and also in Wallonia only for Walloon parties so they only look out for their own regions intrest. And to make things works in the parties themself their are major conflicts and splits. in my opinion they should refederalise everything and let us be able to vote for the other language parties or just split the country for good. Just not this mess with 6 goverments for only 11 million people).  That would be diffucelt because of Brussels its an exclave in flanders but they speak largely French (also the EU and Nato institutions are their and we wouldn't want them to leave since they create lots of jobs and wealth of our population. They sometimes say that the only things holding Belgium together are our king, Brussels and our soccer team

 

omg it's the most complicated politics I ever read, it's amazing that you managed to have a goverement all this time, it's crazy

You're too separated, is there any proposal to change that?

[Varys 30,916]

2 minutes ago, xoxo Craig said:

I reading about this... and because there are so many people from different backgrounds then it is difficult to all agree and command a majority government    Its so complex

and all that in an area of only 30,688 km2 and 11 million people

[Varys 30,916]

2 minutes ago, River said:

omg it's the most complicated politics I ever read, it's amazing that you managed to have a goverement all this time, it's crazy

You're too separated, is there any proposal to change that?

Some want to rejoin with the netherlands,france and germany, others want to split and become independent with Brussels as a sort of city state with Eu protections. Others want to make sure that the federal goverment is only responisble for the military,justice and security the rest would be the mandate of the regions and others want to put everything back to the federal goverment and make sure we can vote for all the parties not  only the ones of the language you speak.

imo we should have one big federal goverment or just split 

[Varys 30,916]

10 minutes ago, Polupojava said:

Well Bosnia still doesn't have a state-level government 14 months after the elections. Our record is 16 months without a government after the elections.

And people here don't mind, it's like we have the standards of Switzerland or Norway. The Parliament of Bosnia didn't have one session during this year because it is boycotted by the Serbs from the Republic of Srpska and there's no quorum without them but they are receiving their monthly salaries of about €2000+.

Which is a bit high considering the minimal pension is 90€ (yup, you've read it right) in Republic of Srpska and the minimal wage is 225€ in the Federation (minimal pensions in the Federation are 150€). 

The official average monthly salary here is 450€ but considering 100,000 people (out of 1.5 million workers) are working for the government and state institutions (and they have the biggest salaries and benefits) the real number is much smaller. Just take into account that Bosnia has 3 presidents + 2 on a lower lever and in total 136 ministers and 14 parliaments.

 Sorry for taking the spotlight from Belgium but you don't have it that bad.

Plus all the ruling parties here are right-wing nationalist. We have an islamophobic president who represents the Serbs and he denies the existence of Bosnia  as a country and wants it to be split in two. (Muslims make up 50% of the population)

oh the balkans are a mess. You are right we don't have it that bad. Even without a function goverment we are still a rich fairly progressive country