Roger Nols: Quasher of Minority Rights

 

How Belgium’s Trump-avant-la-lettre Employed Xenophobia to Win Elections in the Seventies

Roger Nols was a French-speaking politician known for his controversial attitude towards the Flemish minority in Brussels, and later on in his career his xenophobic views on immigration. Starting his career as a member of the liberal party, he eventually would co-found a party aimed towards representing the French-speaking majority in Brussels, the Front des Francophones (‘FDF’). Towards the end of his career, Nols main ideological selling points were more and more focused on immigration. He founded the Brussels division of the well-known extreme right-wing Front National (‘FN’), and was a great admirer of its French president Jean-Marie Le Pen. 

 

It was Nols's phlegmatic style that still earns him a place in the minds (but not the hearts) of Brussels’ citizens today. Other, less polarising politicians sometimes get in the habit of bending the rules as well, but Nols had the gift of always putting himself in the centre of attention while doing so. He once campaigned with the slogan: 'Flemish imperialists out', which made him the symbol of the pompous French-speaking Brussels bourgeois in the eyes of the Dutch speakers, in whose minds Brussels was still a Flemish city.

French-speaking protesters sending a clear message towards the Dutch-speakers: 'Stinky farmers, return to your villages!'

The language law of 1962 placed Dutch on the same footing as French in Brussels. In itself, one would consider this perfectly logical: in a bilingual country (actually trilingual, but the German-speaking part is sometimes left out, it is difficult enough as it is) like Belgium, it seems logical that both languages enjoy an official and equal status in the capital. But one must not lose track of the situation in Brussels, where even before the 1960s French was omnipresent, which made Brussels a French-speaking city in reality. (the graph below displays the data of the official language censuses, which Dutch-speakers refused to allow after 1947 because the dwindling Dutch-speaking population could jeopardize their position in Brussels)

 

It should therefore come as no surprise that the implementation of a law that places both languages on an equal footing in Brussels did not go down all that easily. Especially for a Brussels politician, whose survival rests on the approval rating with the French-speaking electorate, it was not opportune to go along with this renewed recognition of Dutch. Nols understood this very well, and the controversial way in which he expressed the French-speaking point of view would earn him the mayoralty of Schaarbeek, the second largest municipality in the Brussels region.

A lot can be said about Nols, but more than other politicians, he did fulfil his electoral promises. As mayor of Schaarbeek, he went directly against the language laws of the 1960s, which stated that civil servants should be bilingual when they come into contact with the public. Nols did not see the point of this measure, after all the inhabitants of Schaarbeek were almost all French-speaking, and filled in the term 'bilingual' in his own way. From now on, the citizens of Schaarbeek could go to four desks manned by monolingual French-speaking officials, supplemented by one desk manned by a Dutch-speaking official. 

In practice, this did not cause too many problems, precisely because the vast majority of the public in Schaarbeek was French-speaking. It was only when a Flemish nationalist activist, Flor Grammens, defaced the 'French-speaking' and 'Dutch-speaking' signs above the counters by way of protest that the ‘lokettenkwestie’ (affaire des guichets or counter-issue) gained attention. The whole issue would even grow into a problem of national proportions, with large (and sometimes violent) protest actions being held by both the Dutch-speaking and the French-speaking sides (see video below). Eventually, the federal government was forced to intervene, marking the apotheosis of the issue. 

Not much has changed in all those years. The 2020 figures from the Vice-Governor, who oversees linguistic parity in Brussels, show that the language legislation is still not being respected:   

"Apart from the parity for positions equal to or higher than head of department, article 21, §7 of the law on administrative language stipulates that at least 50% of the positions to be filled must be equally divided between the two language groups. It is impossible for my department to permanently monitor the staff turnover in each individual municipality and PCSW. If we note, however, that only 254 (7.6%) of the 3,329 recruitment files in 2020 concerned Dutch speakers, it may be suspected that at least in a number of local authorities the minimum representation of 25% Dutch speakers is not being achieved." (own translation)

 

One might wonder: does it just take a new Flor Grammens to rip open the old wounds again? I’d say that is not likely, because several factors make that the situation regarding language in Brussels is different now. Firstly, the position of Dutch has been weakened even more since the 1970s, and the Dutch-speaking activists have been forced to shift their focus to the Frenchification of the Brussels periphery. But secondly, the language issue in Brussels is no longer a race between two horses. In the meantime, Brussels has been proclaimed the (unofficial) capital of Europe, and English has become the lingua franca between Dutch-speaking commuters, French-speaking residents and English-speaking EU officials. Moreover, the exploding globalisation has made Brussels a cosmopolitan city, where Arabic, Spanish, Italian, German and many other languages are also frequently spoken. (see graph)  

This shift in focus with regards to language in Brussels is also reflected in the political career of Roger Nols. As I mentioned earlier, Nols was a politician pur sang, who had an excellent sense of what was important to his electorate and built his political victories on that. When the importance of the linguistic struggle against Dutch began to wane, he mobilised the French-speaking majority to battle a new enemy: the migrant. In his well-known style, he mounted a camel and paraded through the city, showing the world how he felt about the growing number of migrants in Brussels. (see picture) His slogans had not lost any of their provocative qualities either: "By charter or C130, with Nols they would have been gone already". 

The counter issue would eventually be settled by a judgment of the Council of State (page 106), enforced with subsequent decisive action by auditor-general Walter Ganshof van der Meersch, who single-handedly removed the signs above the counters. The Dutch-French language battle seems to have cooled down in the meantime, but the same cannot be said of Nols’ other battle in Brussels… (see the headlines below, which are about the statue of Nols shown in the first video)

 

'He crossed the line with the camel: "Statue of racist mayor has to go"'​

 

'Presence of Roger Nols statue is cause for controversy in Schaarbeek: should it be taken away or be left in place "as a testimony to the past"?'

 

 

   

'Anti-racism movement wants statue of former resistance fighter gone'​