A Vlaams Belang's election leaflet triggered claims of racism after it included a cartoon depicting a number of figures caricaturing foreigners pushing an elderly white man away from the door of Beersel's local social services.
In Beersel (Flemish Brabant) a number of residents are reportedly outraged after a cartoon in a Vlaams Belang election leaflet dropped through people’s letterboxes. ‘It’s a racist drawing,’ several locals told VRT News.
Klaas Slootmans, who heads the list of candidates for the far right Vlaams Belang in Beersel for the local elections on 13 October, concedes the drawing pulls no punches, but counters: ‘This is the reality. There is such a large influx from Brussels, especially of foreigners. The budget needed to pay minimum subsistence allowance, known as the ‘living wage’ in Belgium, has tripled in only a few years. Half of all benefits go to foreigners. If you include people of foreign origin, it's almost 80 to 90 per cent.’
Migration freeze
‘I am not against migration, but it has to be reasonable,’ argues Slootmans. ‘In Beersel, it is out of proportion. Schools are full of non-native speakers and at some sports clubs the main language is French. That has to stop. Beersel has reached its saturation point. We want to reintroduce the 1980s settlement law introduced by the late Jean Gol (Francophone liberal). This legislation allowed municipalities with large immigrant communities to refuse to register new migrant inhabitants.’