Di Rupo was born in Morlanwelz, Wallonia, to Italian parents. His father was born in San Valentino in Abruzzo Citeriore. While Di Rupo was born in Belgium,[3] his brothers and sisters were all born in Italy. When he was one year old, his father died in a car crash and his mother was unable to raise all seven children. Due to the poor financial state of his family, three of his brothers were raised in a nearby orphanage.[4]
When he was 12, he attended boarding school. Due to medical issues, Di Rupo had to re-do his first year of high school twice, but eventually excelled in science at the end of his high school years.[5] This led him to pursue a degree in chemistry at the University of Mons, where he eventually obtained a PhD in Chemistry, after being a part-time lecturer at Leeds University as well.
Political career
Di Rupo came in contact with the socialist movement for the first time during his studies in Mons, where he first obtained a master's degree and afterwards a PhD in chemistry. He went during the preparation of his doctorate to the University of Leeds (United Kingdom), where his function was that of lecture member of staff in 1977–1978.[6]
He started his political career as an attaché at the cabinet of Jean-Maurice Dehousse in 1980–81. His first political mandate came in 1982, when he was Councillor of Mons (until 1985, and again from 1988 until 2000). In 1986, he was mayor of health, urban renewal and social affairs. Professionally, Di Rupo was at the same time cabinet member and then Deputy Head of Cabinet of the minister of finance of that time of the Walloon region and consequently Deputy Head of Cabinet of the minister of finance and energy of the Walloon region at that time Philippe Busquin (1981–85) and superintendent of the energy-inspection of the ministry of the Walloon region.[citation needed]
In 2000, he became the mayor of Mons,[8] which is the capital of the province of Hainaut.
In 1987, he got his national political breakthrough. He was elected as member of the Chamber of Deputies and went two years later for a short time to the European Parliament.
In 1991, Di Rupo was chosen as a senator, but shortly afterwards (1992), he took in the French-speaking community his first ministerial function in Education and later also Media. These were his responsibilities until Guy Coëme, who was mentioned in the Agusta-scandal, resigned and Di Rupo went to the federal government in 1994 as Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Traffic and Governmental companies. Following the elections in 1995, he remained the Vice-Prime Minister of Belgium and was appointed minister of Economics and Telecommunications. In 1995 he signed the merger of the Belgian airline Sabena with Swiss Air that eventually led to the bankruptcy of Sabena with thousands of unemployed employees as result.[9]
In 1996, at the time of the Dutroux affair, Olivier Trusgnach, a prostitute, alleged that Di Rupo paid him for sex while Trusgnach was still a minor.[10] This accusation could have meant the end of his political career. Di Rupo denied the accusations.
After the federal and regional elections of June 1999 in which, due to the Dioxin Affair, the Christian-Democrats lost many of their votes, Di Rupo negotiated with the Flemish socialists of sp.a, the Liberals and Green Party to form a "purple-green" government. Di Rupo himself was in charge of the function of minister-president of the Walloon region, but already in October of the same year the members of the party chose him as president and in April 2000, he was succeeded in his function of minister-president by Jean-Claude Van Cauwenberghe.[citation needed]
As new president of the party, Di Rupo was forced to make a generation change within the PS and go down a new path. During the regional and federal elections of 1995 and 1999, the PS lost many of its votes, partly because of corruption scandals in the 1990s (named Agusta-scandal and UNIOP-affair), in which the most prominent PS-politicians were involved. PS had been in the government subsequently since 1988 (in the regional government and in the federal government), but the liberal PRL (now MR) became in the 1999-elections as strong as the PS. Apart from those two, Ecolo also became an important political party. Di Rupo realised that drastic action was required to regain the position of the PS. By several measures, such as "Contrat d'avenir pour la Wallonie" (Contract for the Future of Wallonia) and a new generation of party leaders, by which Marie Arena was important, he tried to reassemble the left wing-forces around him. Successfully, because in the elections of 2003, PS regained the electoral score of 1991 and was by far the most important political party before MR. During the regional elections of 2004, it also became the most important party in the Brussels capital region.[citation needed]
Di Rupo in 2007
Di Rupo changed, in 2004, the liberal coalition partner for the Christian-democratic party, in the Walloon Government and in the Brussels Capital Government (in the last also the green party Ecolo was part of the government). By doing this, coalitions were made which differed from the federal coalition at that time. In October 2005, he became Minister-President of Wallonia[8] after Jean-Claude Van Cauwenberghe resigned amid a corruption scandal, involving several members of Di Rupo's party. He continued as party leader though and has had to deal with the PS's ICDI affair that emerged in May 2006.[citation needed]
In 2006 and 2007, Di Rupo and his party appeared unsuccessful in trying to clean out corruption. This was probably instrumental in the party's losing its first place amongst French community parties 2007 federal election.[11] Di Rupo then decided to take a firmer stance against corruption in Charleroi: he virtually took control of the city's Socialist Party and ordered the Socialist mayor and aldermen to resign.[12][13]
After former PS president Guy Spitaels urged him to choose between the presidency of the party and of the Walloon Government, Di Rupo decided to organise internal elections for party president in July 2007 rather than in October of that year and announced that he would resign from his mandate as Minister-President if re-elected. On 11 July 2007, he was re-elected president of the Socialist Party with 89.5% of the votes.[14]
Prime Minister of Belgium
Following the 2010 Belgian general election, in which the PS emerged as the largest of the Francophone parties and the second largest political party in Belgium, speculation emerged as to whether Di Rupo could be the Prime Minister in a new government. The RTBF raised questions, however, about whether Di Rupo's limited fluency in Dutch would be a stumbling block in seeking that office; every prime minister since 1979 had been a Fleming.[citation needed]
In May 2011, he was appointed Formateur by King Albert II, which gave Di Rupo the task of forming a government. Traditionally, the Formateur also becomes the Prime Minister of the government he forms. He became prime minister of the Di Rupo I Government on 6 December 2011.[15]
With Di Rupo's appointment, Belgium ended 589 days without a government, believed to be the longest such streak ever for a country in the developed world. Yves Leterme had resigned on 26 April 2010 and had been serving as caretaker prime minister since then.[16]
Di Rupo meets with President of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen on 5 January 2024
Di Rupo describes himself as an "atheist, rationalist, and Freemason."[4] He is fluent in Italian, French and English. After becoming Prime Minister, he took Dutch lessons to address his previous limited fluency in the language and this improved enough for him to be able to address the parliament in Dutch and conduct TV interviews in the language.[18]
Di Rupo came out as gay in 1996, and when asked by a confrontational "media pack" if he was gay, he responded, "Yes. So what?"[4] He is the first openly gay man to lead a sovereign state, and the first openly gay person to win the position through an election.[19]
Between Di Rupo's election and 2013, he was one of the only three openly gay or lesbian national heads of government, the other ones being Icelandic Prime Minister Jóhanna Sigurðardóttir, and Luxembourgish Prime Minister Xavier Bettel.[20]
↑ The party lost 20% of its seats at the Chamber of Representatives, see also this articleArchived 30 September 2007 at the Wayback Machine that analyses the impact on socialists
The politics of Belgium take place in the framework of a federal, representative democratic, constitutional monarchy. The King of the Belgians is the head of state, and the prime minister of Belgium is the head of government, in a multi-party system. Executive power is exercised by the government. Federal legislative power is vested in both the government and the two chambers of parliament, the Senate and the Chamber of Representatives. The federation is made up of (language-based) communities and (territorial) regions. Philippe is the seventh and current King of the Belgians, having ascended the throne on 21 July 2013.
Federal elections were held in Belgium on 18 May 2003, the first under a new electoral code. One of the novelties was an electoral threshold of 5, which has cost many seats to the N-VA and the Green parties, Ecolo and Agalev. The Belgian Socialists recovered well; the liberal and nationalist parties increased their vote as well.
The Socialist Party is a social democratic French-speaking political party in Belgium. As of the 2019 elections, it is the third largest party in the Belgian Chamber of Representatives and the largest Francophone party. The party is led by Paul Magnette. The party supplies the Minister-president of the French Community, and the Brussels-Capital Region. In the German-speaking community, the party is known as the Sozialistische Partei (SP).
Yves Camille Désiré Leterme is a Belgian politician, a leader of the Christian Democratic and Flemish party (CD&V). He was the prime minister of Belgium, from November 2009 to December 2011.
The Federal Government of Belgium exercises executive power in the Kingdom of Belgium. It consists of ministers and secretary of state drawn from the political parties which form the governing coalition. The federal government is led by the prime minister of Belgium, and ministers lead ministries of the government. Ministers together form the Council of Ministers, which is the supreme executive organ of the government.
Guy Gustave Arthur Ghislain Spitaels was a Belgian politician of the Socialist Party. He was the 7th Minister-President of Wallonia from 1992 to 1994 and president of his party for thirteen years, until he was succeeded by Philippe Busquin.
Paul Magnette is a Belgian politician. Since 2019, he is the leader of the Socialist Party, social democratic French-speaking party in Belgium. Since 2012, he is also mayor of Charleroi. At academic level, he is a former political science professor at the Free University of Brussels (ULB) and Director of the Institute of European Studies of the ULB. He was appointed minister in the Belgian federal government from 2007 to 2013 and was Minister-President of Wallonia from 2014 to 2017. He also was a member of the Senate of Belgium, of the Parliament of Wallonia and of the Parliament of the French Community.
The 2007–2008 Belgian government formation followed the general election of 10 June 2007, and comprised a period of negotiation in which the Flemish parties Flemish Liberal Democratic, Christian Democratic and Flemish (CD&V) and New Flemish Alliance (N-VA), and the French-speaking parties Reformist Movement (MR), Democratic Front of Francophones (FDF) and Humanist Democratic Centre (CdH) negotiated to form a government coalition. The negotiations were characterized by the disagreement between the Dutch- and French-speaking parties about the need for and nature of a constitutional reform. According to some, this political conflict could have led to a partition of Belgium.
The Cabinet of the French Community of Belgium is the executive branch of the French Community of Belgium, and it sits in Brussels. It consists of a number of ministers chosen by the Parliament of the French Community and is headed by a Minister-President.
The partition of Belgium is a hypothetical situation, which has been discussed by both Belgian and international media, envisioning a split of Belgium along linguistic divisions, with the Flemish Community (Flanders) and the French-speaking Community (Wallonia) becoming independent states. Alternatively, it is hypothesized that Flanders could join the Netherlands and Wallonia could join France.
The 2007–2011 Belgian political crisis was a period of tense communal relations and political instability in Belgium, which was rooted in the differing opinions on state reform, and in the continued existence of the controversial electoral district of Brussels-Halle-Vilvoorde (BHV). Parties from the Dutch-speaking Flemish Community are in general strongly in favour for a devolution of powers to the communities and regions, and the splitting of the unconstitutional BHV district, while French-speaking French Community of Belgium is generally in favour of retaining the status quo. After the 2010 elections, the topics of public debt, deficit cuts and socio-economic reform were added to the debate, with most Flemish parties in favour of finding money by strongly reducing spending, whilst the proposals supported by most French-speaking parties also included a significant raise in taxes. The crisis came to an end in December 2011 with the inauguration of a new federal government which agreed on partition of the BHV district and on policies aimed at tackling the economic downturn. The country's continuing linguistic divide played a large part in the crisis. Several times during the period Belgium was threatened to be split up amid rising Flemish separatism.
Federal elections were held in Belgium on 13 June 2010, during the midst of the 2007-11 Belgian political crisis. After the fall of the previous Leterme II Government over the withdrawal of Open Flemish Liberals and Democrats from the government the King dissolved the legislature and called new elections. The New Flemish Alliance, led by Bart De Wever, emerged as the plurality party with 27 seats, just one more than the francophone Socialist Party, led by Elio Di Rupo, which was the largest party in the Wallonia region and Brussels. It took a world record 541 days until a government was formed, resulting in a government led by Di Rupo.
Following the Belgian general election held on 13 June 2010, a process of cabinet formation started in Belgium. The election produced a very fragmented political landscape, with 11 parties elected to the Chamber of Representatives, none of which won more than 20% of the seats. The Flemish-Nationalist New Flemish Alliance (N-VA), the largest party in Flanders and the country as a whole, controlled 27 of 150 seats in the lower chamber. The Francophone Socialist Party (PS), the largest in Wallonia, controlled 26 seats. Cabinet negotiations continued for a long time. On 1 June 2011, Belgium matched the record for time taken to form a new democratic government after an election, at 353 days, held until then by Cambodia in 2003–2004. On 11 October 2011, the final agreement for institutional reform was presented to the media. A government coalition was named on 5 December 2011 and sworn in after a total of 541 days of negotiations and formation on 6 December 2011, and 589 days without an elected government with Elio Di Rupo named Prime Minister of the Di Rupo I Government.
The Walloon Government or Government of Wallonia is the executive branch of Wallonia, and it is part of one of the six main governments of Belgium. It sits in Namur, where the Parliament of Wallonia is seated as well.
The Di Rupo Government was the federal cabinet of Belgium sworn in on 6 December 2011, after a record-breaking 541 days of negotiations following the June 2010 elections. The government included social democrats (sp.a/PS), Christian democrats (CD&V/cdH) and liberals, respectively of the Dutch and French language groups. The government notably excluded the New Flemish Alliance (N-VA), the Flemish nationalist party which achieved a plurality and became the largest party. Its absence, together with the unwillingness of Open Vld to enter into an eight-party coalition that included the green parties, caused the government coalition to lack a majority in the Dutch language group. It was the first time that the Belgian prime minister had been openly gay, as Di Rupo became the world's first male openly gay head of government. Elio Di Rupo also became the first native French-speaking prime minister since 1979 and the first prime minister from Wallonia since 1974 and first socialist prime minister since 1974.
Events in the year 2011 in Belgium.
The sixth state reform in the federal kingdom of Belgium is the result after the 2010–2011 Belgian government formation, with 541 days of negotiations, the longest ever in Belgium and possibly the world. The agreement was made among the Christian-democratic CD&V and cdH, social-democratic sp.a and PS, liberal Open Vld and MR and ecologist Groen! and Ecolo, each respectively a Flemish and French-speaking party. The first six parties, therefore not including the green parties, then formed the Di Rupo I Government. The Flemish nationalist party New Flemish Alliance, which became the largest after the 2010 elections, is notably not part of the agreement nor of the government coalition.
Federal elections were held in Belgium on 25 May 2014. All 150 members of the Chamber of Representatives were elected, whereas the Senate was no longer directly elected following the 2011–2012 state reform. These were the first elections held under King Philippe's reign.
Following the simultaneous federal elections and regional elections of 25 May 2014, negotiations started to form a new Federal Government as well as new regional governments: a Flemish, Walloon, French Community and Brussels Government. A Government of the German-speaking Community was formed only a few days after the elections.
Federal elections were held in Belgium on 26 May 2019, alongside the country's European and regional elections. All 150 members of the Chamber of Representatives were elected from eleven multi-member constituencies.
References
(in French)Visite à domicile Interview with Di Rupo in French (17 May 2007)
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