Belgians make most of living on political and cultural fault line

On Sunday morning, along with millions of others in Belgium, I set out for my local polling station, voting card in hand, to exercise my democratic right and vote in the European elections.

Walking through the leafy, French-speaking neighbourhood south of the EU quarter, it was difficult to conceive that less than 24 hours earlier, a gunman had opened fire in the Jewish Museum in central Brussels, killing four people.

Along with dozens of other journalists preparing for the next day’s elections, I had scrambled to the upmarket Sablon area, a warren of chocolate shops and antique stores, as the news emerged on Saturday afternoon. The scene had the air of sinister calm that envelops public areas in the aftermath of random, unimaginable acts of violence.

Police tape fluttered in the breeze, tourists aimlessly looked on, and police huddled in small groups, briefing the media. As the crowds headed for home, journalists packed up their cameras and a few onlookers and reporters lingered in the nearby bars, sipping Belgian beer as Saturday night whirred into action. In Washington DC, a shooting spree last year prompted police to order people to stay indoors. In Belgium, just a few hours after the killing, life had returned to normal. The suspect is still at large.

Deeply divided

Belgium is a geopolitical paradox: a country deeply divided linguistically and politically, but one that has seldom seen its entrenched divides spill into violence. Saturday’s shooting, believed to be an anti-Semitic attack, is one of a number of random acts of violence that have shaken the country, most recently – prior to last Saturday – the 2011 Liege attack, which left six dead and 125 people injured after a 33-year-old man attacked civilians.

But violent expressions of political separatism that pepper the history of other divided countries are absent. However, Belgium is no Switzerland, the archetype of co-linguistic peace and harmony.

Belgium's two big communities (there is a small German- speaking population) are strongly divided. Most of this manifests itself linguistically. It is one of the reasons why English has effectively become the lingua franca in Brussels – people see English as a safe bet in a culture where language indicates cultural affiliation.

Road signs in Belgium are not bilingual, but tend to be written in either language. If you drive from Brussels to Lille, the French city is signposted as its Dutch translation, Rijsel, leaving many drivers scrambling to navigate the daunting road system. Bruges becomes Brugge once you leave Brussels and move north into Flanders. Antwerp, for French speakers, is Anvers.

These divides are entrenched. The decentralised political system means many political decisions are made by regional governments, distancing the two communities.

Citizens can vote for candidates in their own region only – even in national polls – with the result that citizens in Flanders are not permitted to vote for French-speaking candidates from Wallonia and vice versa.

It also applies to European elections, in which EU residents in Belgium are allowed to partake. On arriving at the local primary school on Sunday, my blue voting card proudly in hand having triumphed over Belgian bureaucracy months earlier and got on the register, I was first given a special voting card with a magnetic strip. E-voting it seems had made it to Belgium.

Electronic pen

Voters then insert the card into a machine and make their choice on a screen using an electronic pen. When finished, the card is returned to the attendant who uploads the information onto a disk.

Once in the booth I was gripped by indecision. The first question on screen was which “electoral college” I was voting for – French or Dutch. For linguistic reasons I opted for French, and was then presented with an array of parties. As in many European countries, voters in Belgium must vote by party rather than individual.

While I was then allowed to choose a candidate within that party, many EU member states operate a closed list by which the party predetermines which candidates will go to Brussels if their party is elected.

As Belgium begins the long process of forming a government after Sunday’s national poll, elections matter in this divided country. Voting is compulsory here, perhaps ironically so considering huge ethical decisions such as the extension of euthanasia rights to children, agreed earlier this year, are decided by Government and not by referendum.

Meanwhile, news emerged this week that a software bug has disrupted electronic votes in some areas, sending the Belgian press into a tailspin. E-voting debacles are not confined to Ireland, it seems.