The members of Groen elected Jeremie Vaneeckhout (37) and Nadia Naji (30) as new co-chairs of the party at a party congress in Schaerbeek. The duo received 57 percent of the vote in the first round.
The duo themselves post a video on Instagram to thank everyone:
“This is the start of a new era for our party. True to our ideals, with nothing but respect for our predecessors. We thank the other duos for the sporting struggle and the members for their confidence”, Naji and Vaneeckhout said in a first reaction.
Naji is 30 years old and comes from Molenbeek. She works as a cabinet employee at Brussels minister Elke Van den Brandt, but is less known to the general public. The 37-year-old Vaneeckhout from Anzegem was vice-chairman of Groen in the past and has been a member of the Flemish Parliament since 2019. Earlier this year he published the book “Forgotten Land”.
The approximately 7,000 members of Groen were able to vote at a conference in the Event Lounge in Schaerbeek, although this was also the first time digitally. “No less than 38 percent of members voted in favor today. The new duo already won in one round of voting with 57 percent of the vote, followed by Juan Benjumea and Elisabeth Meuleman (35 percent) and Jenna Boeve and Jad Zeitouni (6 percent),” the party said in a press release.
On Wednesday, March 23, President Almaci and Vice-President Dany Neudt announced their retirement from the head of the Green Party. The announcement happened rather unexpectedly, but did not come completely out of the blue. Almaci had been president since 2014, but internally support seemed to have gradually trickled away – an evolution that had already started since the disappointing 2019 elections and which mediocre polls have not been able to reverse since.
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