Guy Spitaels

Guy Spitaels (born September 3, 1931 in Ath , † August 21, 2012 in Uccle / Ukkel ) was a Belgian politician of the Parti Socialiste (PS) and professor of political science. He was a long-time minister at national level, mayor of Ath and from 1992 to 1994 Prime Minister of the Walloon Region . He was president of the PS, in which he was nicknamed Dieu (God) because of his influence . After it became apparent that Spitaels had participated in corruption deals in the course of the so-called Agusta affair , for which he was convicted by the Court of Cassation in 1998 , he resigned from all his offices and gradually disappeared from active political life.

Life

Guy Spitaels received his doctorate in law from the Université Catholique de Louvain (UCL) in 1955 , was a licentiate in political and social sciences (1957, UCL) and had a diploma in European studies (1958, College of Europe in Bruges ). But he began his academic career at the Université Libre de Bruxelles (ULB), where he first worked as a researcher at the Solvay Institute for Sociology (1958–1964) and headed this institute from 1964 to 1968. From 1966 he was a professor at the ULB and the College of Europe, among others, and was then retired and made an honorary professor at the ULB.

Since the end of his political career, Spitaels has increasingly appeared as an expert on international politics. For example, he is the author of monographs on the People's Republic of China as a hegemonic power and on the election of US President Barack Obama , which have been translated into several languages.

Guy Spitaels died on the night of August 20-21, 2012 of complications from a brain tumor.

Beginnings and advancement to vice premier

Guy Spitaels' family was very little politically active and he only got into politics when he was over thirty years old. His entry into the Parti Socialiste Belge (PSB), the predecessor of the PS, in 1960 was due to the protests against the so-called "Unity Law". At the same time, Spitaels also joined the Mouvement populaire wallon , a regionalist movement under André Renard .

Spitaels was introduced into active politics from 1972 by the then president of the PS, André Cools . This even promoted him to head of cabinet under Prime Minister Edmond Leburton (PS) in 1973 . In 1974 Spitaels entered the Senate for the first time , albeit as an opposition politician.

1977 was a successful year for Guy Spitaels: On the one hand, he was able to defend his place in the Senate and, on the other hand, he managed to take over the mayor's office in his hometown of Ath (and keep it for over 20 years). In addition, as a result of the government negotiations, he received the post of Minister for Employment and Labor in the government of Prime Minister Leo Tindemans ( CVP ). There the professor for social economy managed to make a name for himself ("Spitaels-Plans") and to reduce the massive unemployment in Belgium at the time. In the following government under Wilfried Martens (CVP) in 1979, Spitaels was appointed Vice Prime Minister and received the influential budget department, where he could not avoid a billion-dollar budget gap. In the following Martens governments he left the household and took over the transport or communications. After the grueling state reform negotiations that had launched the regions and the failure of the Martens IV government in 1981, the PS finally left the government level and Spitaels had to give up his ministerial post.

Presidency of the PS

The future of Guy Spitaels, however, played out within the PS. After the division of the PSB in 1979, André Cools was clearly the strongest man in the party, but in 1981 he came under the party's internal and public criticism (especially from the unions), so that he had to give up the presidency of the PS. In the election for the new president, his former protégé Spitaels was just able to prevail over Ernest Glinne , who was favored by Leburton . As the new president, Guy Spitaels first faced the task of reconciling the warring wing of the party, which he succeeded in doing. In the early eighties he also gave the PS a new direction: “Plus socialiste et plus wallon” (more socialist and Walloon). On the one hand, he won the socialist trade union (FGTB) back on his side and, on the other hand, he campaigned for a strengthening of the Walloon region , for example by calling for a regionalization of the steel industry , which was mainly present in Wallonia (including Cockerill-Sambre ). At the national level, he initially sent the PS on an opposition cure.

Spitaels countered the escalation in the language dispute over the municipality of Voeren (French: Fourons ) with the support of the Francophone mayor José Happart , who was heavily criticized by the Flemish side , by bringing him to the camp of the PS, and thus promoted the failure of the conservative-liberal Martens government. Gol in 1987. This regionalist dodging was generously rewarded in the 1987 elections: The PS received 44% of the vote, became the strongest Francophone political faction for the first time since 1936 and only narrowly missed an absolute majority in the parliaments (then still councilors) of the Walloon Region and the French Community . The PS was also inevitable at the national level: Guy Spitaels was appointed an informator by the king and was supposed to prepare the way for a government builder. However, this set the course for the longest state crisis in Belgian history: It was not until May 1988 and 148 days after the elections, during which a compromise for Voeren and the third state reform were negotiated, that the Martens VIII government, which was made up of Christian Socialists, Socialists and composed of the Flemish nationalists of the Volksunie (VU). Spitaels himself, who had to contend with criticism from within the PS, did not belong to the government.

Despite everything, Spitaels had managed to lead the PS into the national government and executive bodies of the Walloon Region and the French Community after five years of opposition. He also had the absolute upper hand in the PS and was confirmed in his presidency. At that time he was nicknamed "Dieu" (God) because of his unmistakable power in the political landscape . With his demand to regionalise the issuing of export licenses for weapons (in fact the Fabrique Nationale (FN) was in Herstal , Wallonia), Spitaels sparked another institutional crisis in the early 1990s and left the last two governments off Wilfried Martens (Martens VIII and Martens IX) fail.

Walloon Prime Minister

Spitaels caused widespread astonishment when he decided in 1992 to leave the presidency of the PS and take over the post of Prime Minister of the Walloon Government. Philippe Busquin (PS) was elected President of the Parti Socialiste and the outgoing Walloon Prime Minister Bernard Anselme (PS) was appointed Prime Minister of the French Community. In a government with the Christian Socialists ( PSC ) he directed the fortunes of the Walloon region until 1994.

During his time as Prime Minister (1992–1994) Guy Spitaels also took on the economic department, SME policy and external relations. During these two years Spitaels succeeded in placing the entire province of Hainaut as "Objective 1" for the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) and in winning a large part of the European structural funds for the Walloon region.

In 1994 the political career of Spitaels in the Walloon Region came to an abrupt end: in the course of the Agusta affair , he and other PS politicians were accused of corruption and an examining magistrate requested that their parliamentary immunity be lifted.

Agusta affair and progressive withdrawal

The origins of the Agusta affair and later the Dassault affair can be found in the investigations that followed the political murder of André Cools (PS) on July 18, 1991. In the course of the investigation and the search for the motive for the crime, the Liège investigating judge uncovered massive transfers of money to the PS bank accounts. Indeed, the Italian airline Agusta donated large sums of money to PS and its Flemish counterpart SP , thereby securing the purchase of 46 A109 attack helicopters for the Belgian Air Force.

As a result, the examining magistrate asked the Chamber and Senate for the lifting of the parliamentary immunity of Guy Coëme (PS), who was Belgian Defense Minister at the time of the crime, Guy Mathot (PS), then a senator, and Guy Spitaels. The "three guys" resigned on January 21, 1994 all together. Resignations were also necessary in the SP in 1995: Frank Vandenbroucke , former party president, foreign minister and vice-premier, and above all Willy Claes , newly appointed Secretary General of NATO , had to vacate their posts. However, 1995 was an election year and, to everyone's surprise, Guy Spitaels not only made the leap into the Walloon Parliament , but also assumed its presidency.

In 1997 the name Spitaels was brought back into connection with occult party financing: In the so-called Dassault affair, which in turn had its origin in the Agusta affair, the former party president of the PS was accused, the French businessman Serge Dassault was accused of awarding one in return for payment To have preferred the contract to upgrade the Belgian F-16 combat aircraft. Another question was asked about the lifting of the hospital's parliamentary immunity, which had been newly obtained after the elections. This time, however, the political pressure was so great that Spitaels had to resign from all political offices as President of the Walloon Parliament and as Mayor of Ath.

In 1998 the investigation into the Agusta-Dassault affair was finally completed. Twelve defendants appeared in front of the court of cassation , including Coëme, Claes and Spitaels. During the course of the trial, Spitaels always protested his innocence. The judges saw it differently and on December 23, 1998 sentenced him to two years suspended prison sentence, a fine of 60,000 BEF and a five-year disqualification from his political rights.

Guy Spitaels had not appeared politically since then.

various

From 1989 to 1992 Spitaels was President of the Federation of Social Democratic Parties of the European Community (today the Social Democratic Party of Europe - SPE) and Vice President of the Socialist International .

Since 1983 he has held the honorary title of "Minister of State". He was elected one of the 100 most important Walloon personalities of the twentieth century by the Jules Destrée Institute .

Overview of political offices

• 1972–1974: Member of several cabinets of ministers
• 1974–1977: Provincial Senator
• 1977–1997: Mayor of Ath (partially prevented)
• 1977–1995: Directly elected senator (partially prevented)
• 1977–1979: Minister for Employment and Labor in the governments of Tindemans IV and Vanden Boeynant II
• 1979–1980: Vice Prime Minister and Minister for the Budget in the Martens I and Martens II Governments
• 1980–1981: Vice Prime Minister and Minister for Transport in the Martens III and Martens IV governments
• 1980–1999: Member of the Walloon Parliament (partially prevented)
• 1992–1994: Prime Minister of the Walloon Region , responsible for the economy, SMEs and external relations
• 1995–1997: President of the Walloon Parliament

literature

• JF. Furnémont: Guy Spitaels, au-delà du pouvoir. Editions Luc Pire, Brussels 2005, ISBN 2-87415-525-X .

Web links

• Biography of Guy Spitaels on the website of the Institut Jules Destrée
• Entry on Guy Spitaels in the Dictionnaire des Wallons

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Chine-USA: La guerre aura-t-elle lieu? Editions Luc Pire, Brussels 2007; Obama president: la méprise. Editions Luc Pire, Brussels 2008.
2. ↑ Lalibre.be: Guy Spitaels est décédé (August 21, 2012) (French)
3. ↑ Lalibre.be: Cools, puis Agusta-Dassault (October 13, 2003) (French)
4. ↑ Le Monde diplomatique: Discrédit politique en Belgique (May 1995) (French)
5. ↑ JP. de Staercke: Agusta-Dassault: la cassation du siècle. Editions Luc Pire, Brussels 1999 (French)