Anti-Immigrant Nationalist Party Gains in Flanders

The far-right Flemish Bloc claimed success in municipal and provincial elections, increasing its lead in Antwerp, Belgium’s second-biggest city, and gaining in the Dutch-speaking north.

“The Flemish Bloc has won again,” party leader Filip Dewinter said Sunday. “Even I had dared not dream this.”

In Antwerp, the Flemish Bloc won 33%, up five percentage points from the last local elections, in 1994, when it emerged as the biggest party in the North Sea port.

The success of the bloc--which campaigns against immigration and in favor of independence for Dutch-speaking Flanders--will increase concerns about a far-right revival across Europe.

Dewinter said electoral success could force Belgium’s mainstream parties to follow the example of Austria’s conservatives, which invited the far-right Freedom Party into government after last year’s legislative elections there.

However, politicians from across Belgium’s political spectrum insisted that they will maintain their boycott of the Flemish Bloc and form local coalitions to keep the party out of local government.

The win gives the bloc 20 of the 55 seats in Antwerp’s municipal council. But Socialist Mayor Leona Detiege said council members will maintain a coalition to keep the nationalists out of power in the Dutch-speaking city, home to many immigrants, mostly from North Africa and Turkey.

The Flemish Bloc also became the top party in the northern cities of Mechelen, with 25.6% of the vote, and Ghent, with 20.2%.