2023-10-24 16:24:00
The new head of Justice will undergo his parliamentary baptism of fire on Wednesday, during a joint committee on the Interior, Security, Migration and Administrative Matters. The Deputy Prime Minister and the Minister in charge of the police, Annelies Verlinden (CD&V) will have to face a heavy fire of questions. At this stage, around thirty questions are planned. They come from both the opposition and the majority.
These questions will aim to shed light on certain gray areas in the events leading to the attack. What regarding the dysfunctions within the justice system highlighted in recent days by numerous magistrates?
Vincent Van Quickenborne “might have been the minister of drafts and perhaps we would have had a more positive outcome”, bluntly torpedoed Tuesday morning the honorary president of the Brussels court of first instance, Luc Hennart in Maxime Binet’s show Café sansfilter (LN24). “Why did the Minister of Justice make such personalized remarks,” he also asked lawyer Marc Uyttendaele in La Libre.
“For Paul Van Tigchelt, I’m not worried,” reassures a Vivaldi intern. “He knows his files like the back of his hand. For Annelies Verlinden, on the other hand, it will be more tense.”
The minister’s responsibility is also highlighted in this matter. Many observers have drawn a parallel with previous times when a justice minister was called to resign. The situation of the Minister of the Interior was then linked to that of the Minister of Justice. During the Dutroux affair, in 1996, the two ministers resigned. In 2016, Koen Geens and Jan Jambon submitted their resignation together. But this was refused to them.
Added to these precedents is the fact that the Prime Minister cited Annelies Verlinden by name in his tweet of October 20, evoking the necessary “clarity” to have on the role of the police. Several members of Vivaldi have since indicated that the elected CD&V had the confidence of the government, but this was not enough to extinguish suspicions.
In the opposition, some are also drawing conclusions from the fact that Alexander De Croo will not come to this committee. “We requested the presence of the Prime Minister for the committee this Wednesday. Answer: he refers to his ministers,” laments Sofie Merckx, head of the PTB group. “It seems like he’s not interested. It’s De Croo’s way or the high way,” jokes another regular at the Chamber.
The Prime Minister’s office tells us that this is simply a problem of agenda. The head of government will be retained in other commissions, particularly for international issues. “We complain because it’s the opposition’s game and we don’t want to give him any favors, underlines a deputy, but we must recognize that he is in Parliament much more often than his predecessor Charles Michel”.
1698168562
#Terrorist #attack #Brussels #pressure #remains #strong #competent #ministers #absence #Prime #Minister #chatter
