Former State Secretary for Budget and Consumer Affairs Eva De Bleeker will have a prominent place in the 2024 elections. That is what Open Vld chairman Egbert Lachaert promised today in ‘De Zevende Dag’ on One. De Bleeker resigned on Friday after her position had become untenable due to some budget errors. Her successor, Alexia Bertrand, was immediately appointed and sworn in.
“Eva is a friend of mine and will remain a friend”, Lachaert said in ‘De Zevende Dag’. “I have promised her a number of things. For me, she remains a talent that we must cherish in Flemish Brabant, a province where we are strong, and she has all my support to get a prominent place in 2024.”
Dismissal inevitable
However, the dismissal was inevitable, the chairman indicated. “Had we continued in the coming weeks, the damage to Eva De Bleeker as a politician would only get worse,” he said. “We had to stop and ensure that the damage to Eva and Alexander (De Croo) does not increase further.”
The new secretary of state, Alexia Bertrand, will keep her party card from MR, but her loyalty will now lie with the Flemish liberals, Lachaert made clear. “Alexia Bertrand is a member of Open Vld and her loyalty, in this mandate as Secretary of State and as a party person, lies with the Prime Minister and with the party.”
“Copypaste of Vlaams Belang”
In the French-speaking media, Lachaert lashed out at the MPs of MR. The way Prime Minister Alexander De Croo was handled in the nuclear dossier and Minister of Justice Vincent Van Quickenborne in the aftermath of the death of an agent in Schaarbeek have gone down the wrong way.
“Our minister was not in an easy position,” he said on ‘C’est pas tous les jour dimanche’, Christophe Deborsu’s debate program on RTL-TVI, about the latter dossier. “It was a delicate file, you shouldn’t approach it in a populist way. And then I see some MPs attacking the minister in a way that is almost a copy paste belongs to Vlaams Belang. I want that to stop, it is no longer acceptable.”
LOOK. This was the blunder course of Eva De Bleeker (Open Vld)
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