The heavyweight of the Liberal Party returned this Tuesday morning to the comments he made the day before, in an interview with the DH, which foreshadow a challenge within the Reform Movement. The MP had thus assured that there would be a Liberal Democrat candidate facing Georges-Louis Bouchez at the end of his term.
Maxime Binet began by asking him the question that everyone wanted to ask him: will he be this candidate? Denis Ducarme assured that this will not necessarily be the case and that it was not a “personal question”. “Jean-Luc Crucke leaves a huge void, he was at the center of the political spectrum. What I simply want to say with my friends to all liberal democrats, social liberals of the Reform Movement, is that he are not orphans. Their voices will be carried when Georges-Louis Bouchez’s term expires. In the history of the Liberal Party, a more conservative current and a more democratic current have always coexisted and they must continue to express themselves. The liberals position themselves from the center to the right and everyone must find their way there”, he said, specifying that it was important to say so given the number of very right positions of its president.
Even if he does not want to speak of a sling or of a challenge initiated within his party – he says he wants to bring to life the historical currents present within the MR – the Liberal MP then indicated that he was surrounded and supported in this desire. “These are not positions one takes when one is alone. I was honored with the confidence of nearly 40% of the members of the MR during the last internal vote, so I can count on the support of a certain number of parliamentarians, elected officials and presidents. of federations to set up these debates.“
He then ended up delivering at the end of the interview a few names that are hidden behind these supports such as Caroline Taquin (Member of the Federal Government and Mayor of Courcelles), Nicolas Tzanetatos (Member of Parliament for the Walloon Region and the Wallonia-Brussels Federation) or also Christine Defraigne (first alderman in the city of Liège, former deputy and president of the Senate).
A group of Liberal Democrats will thus set up workshops, internal debates to work on writing a manifesto for social liberalism.
“The posture adopted by Georges-Louis isolates us from a certain number of other parties”
This campaign announcement comes as outings by the president of MR have made even the vice-president of the Open VLD, Vincent Van Quickenborne, react. who felt this weekend that French-speaking liberals were conservative. Denis Ducarme admitted at the microphone of Maxime Binet that it was “unheard of between liberals“. He thus lamented, “in this context of health crisis, while the whole society is suffering, to see politicians like the vice-premier Open VLD indicate that a party president is barking.” “I think we can debate without bordering on insult.”
The Liberal deputy thus did not rule out the fear of seeing the MR be disembarked and replaced by the cdH in the federal and Walloon government and preferred to answer: “There is an element in the current method of Georges-Louis Bouchez that I consider to be a bad choice: to debate it is not enough simply to always place oneself in confrontation, in the cleavage. We are in a moment of crisis which implies that politicians must rather dialogue, reconcile society and this is not the posture adopted by Georges-Louis, on the contrary. And I believe, in fact, that this isolates us from a certain number of other parties.”
He thus once more wanted to distance himself from one of the last announcements of his president, to whom he sent his red card. “Georges-Louis Bouchez, to flatter some ultras or enthusiasts of French politics, tells us that he respects Zemmour more for the consistency of his ideas than a democrat. I cannot admit that. As a liberal, we cannot can’t trivialize horrible ideas like these just by petty political calculations.”
Denis Ducarme then tackled other politicians who also spoke regarding the identity of his party. Paul Magnette, president of the socialist party, declared that the MR was more conservative than liberal. “Magnette continues a mad race that began several years ago behind one of the most Stalinist far left that we know in Europe, namely the PTB. This makes the social democrats very uncomfortable. In Charleroi, he preferred meet the PTB rather than discuss with the MR. He is in no position to give lessons to the MR on internal debates”, he retorted.
As for Maxime Prévot, president of the cdH currently in mutation, who made an appeal with his foot to the social liberals who were uncomfortable with the MR… Denis Ducarme described him as “at bay” and invited him to join him and those parliamentarians ready to write a manifesto for social liberalism.
Finally, he sent his green card to Jean-Luc Crucke, “a friend”, sharing it with Adrien Dolimont (successor of Jean-Luc Crucke in the Walloon government). “I want to encourage him and tell him once once more that I am 100% on his side.”
Hot issues at the federal level
The debates on the vaccination obligation begin today in the Health Committee. For the heavyweight of the MR, this one is a false good idea. “Why vaccinate children aged 5 or 8? We must recognize that some people are more fragile than others and focus on them. We are not going to prick people by force! We must convince rather than threaten”, he defended, specifying that this complicated debate was coming late… too late.
Another hot issue currently being discussed at the federal level: the extension of nuclear power. On Monday, the Federal Agency for Nuclear Control (AFCN) issued its long-awaited opinion which gives a big boost to plan B, to the extension. A victory for the Liberal Party. “It’s a victory on the merits, everyone told us that it was not possible, that we were trying to resuscitate a corpse. It’s not true!”, he rejoiced before advancing: “Now we will see if others will be dogmatic and will refuse the objectivity of this report and put an end to nuclear power by endangering the security of supply and energy prices”.
