BRUSSELS : Vote! It’s the Law

All Belgians will go to the polls Sunday --it’s against the law not to vote--to elect new members of Parliament. The outcome is likely to be a government very much like the current one.

That would mean another coalition of the Dutch-speaking and French-speaking wings of the centrist (Christian Democratic) and slightly leftist (Socialist) parties. Wilfried Martens, prime minister and the leader of the Dutch-speaking Christian Democratic Party, is likely to head the new government as well, his 10th in a little more than 12 years.

The overriding campaign issues are immigration--from North Africa and the former Belgian colony of Zaire--and the related fear of crime. One campaign brochure, by candidates from the somewhat rightist Liberal Party in Brussels, tries to scare voters with a cartoon of black Africans in stereotypical native dress (and undress) standing before a vending machine that offers various forms of legal entry to Belgium.