Rebrand of community into ‘Ostbelgien’ causes alarm in Wallonia, but ministers insist they have no plans to leave

At the Mattar bakery in Eupen, the apprentice master baker Veronica Meÿs presides over the goods on sale: dark German rye loaves, buttery French croissants and sweet Belgian waffles.

The variety is no accident. Eupen is a German-speaking town in a French-speaking part of Belgium, where people zip across borders without a thought.

Despite the range of identities, most locals do not appear to be troubled by questions of nationality. “I am Belgian,” 17-year old Meÿs says without hesitation. “It’s what my identity card says.”



But a recent move to rebrand the region, officially known as the German-speaking community of Belgium (die Deutschsprachige Gemeinschaft Belgiens), as the snappier “Ostbelgien” has caused tremors of anxiety in a country long plagued by talk of separatism.

Eupen is the capital of Ostbelgien, or east Belgium. The region, which has a population of 77,000, has a parliament, government and flag. Thanks to Belgium’s highly devolved political order, it holds a potential veto over any trade deal between post-Brexit Britain and the EU.



For decades, sparring between Belgium’s dominant Flemish and French-speaking regions meant it did not get a look in. But the decision to rebrand has caused ripples of alarm in Wallonia, the primarily French-speaking half of Belgium that contains and funds the German-speaking lands.

A recent straw poll on the streets of Eupen for broadcaster RTL found that 90% of people did not see themselves as Walloon, triggering a new round of debate about identity and the head-spinning complexity of a country with seven parliaments, three official languages and two levels of devolution: geographical and linguistic.

Marc Uyttendaele, a constitutional law professor at the Free University of Brussels, warned that the new name of Ostbelgien would only cause confusion. He said it was “misleading” and not sanctioned by the constitution.

Oliver Paasch, Ostbelgien’s minister-president, rejects claims of separatism. “It is the opposite: 99% are pro-Belgian, very loyal to their country,” he says. The new name “does not signify any political or constitutional demands, but is pure marketing logic for very pragmatic reasons”.



Facebook Twitter Pinterest A couple walk with their child through the centre of Eupen. Many residents of the city have to cross borders to go to work. Photograph: Alamy

Like much of Europe, Ostbelgien is getting older, with not enough young people entering the labour market to pay for the pensions of retiring baby boomers, he says. “We are facing a difficult demographic situation. We need to attract more qualified people. If you talk about the ‘German-speaking community’ in Germany, people think you are talking about German-speaking communities in London or New York. No one thinks automatically about Belgium.”

Locals refer to themselves as the last Belgians. This is true: the German-speaking areas did not become part of Belgium until 1920, after the Treaty of Versailles, but the description also speaks to the varying strength of Belgian national feeling. In a wry allusion to the nationalist movement in the Dutch-speaking Flanders region, Myriam Pelzer, a spokeswoman at the local parliament, says: “We are the last who became Belgians and the last who feel Belgian.”

People think you are talking about German speakers in London or New York. No one thinks automatically about Belgium Oliver Paasch

If national politics are tricky, there is always the EU to bind – most – Belgians together. Take a short stroll down Eupen’s main street and you will see three EU flags flying. More than 33% of the working-age population cross a border for work and people switch between languages with ease. German is inflected with French: Ostbelgiens ask for die plates wasser (still water) from der frigo (the fridge), sprinkling French words into their native language.

Beneath modern border hopping ease lies a painful past. People changed nationality three times between 1918 and 1945, and one in six adults were jailed during sweeping denazification. But the region’s MEP, Pascal Arimont, says Ostbelgien has a very favourable status. Talk of a breakup “scares very much people living here”, he says. “They don’t want to be other than what they are. We don’t want to be part of Germany, Luxembourg, or even Wallonia, although we are [part of the latter] in a strictly jurisdictional way.”

In Germany, the region would be akin to a small suburb; in Belgium, it has power and a walk-on role in official pageantry. Local leaders hobnob with visiting royals and are invited to white tie banquets on overseas state visits. From its small stone parliament on a verdant green hill, Ostbelgien controls education, culture and some social and employment policy, all underpinned by a grant from the Walloon region.



Facebook Twitter Pinterest Eupen is part of the Ostbelgien region, with a population of 77,000, which has its own parliament, government and flag. Photograph: Alamy

It also has the power to veto international treaties, including EU trade deals. Last year, the arrangement between the EU and Canada nearly collapsed when the Walloon parliament threatened to block it.

Could it veto a future EU-UK deal? “Perhaps,” says Arimont, although he does not think this advisable. “Those who say is not possible that 70,000 people might decide on such a big treaty are right that it is not really democratic in a European way. But it is democratic in a Belgian way.”

The minister-president is cautious. Ostbelgien has never used its veto. “It is clear we must be prudent with this right we have under the constitution; we cannot abuse it,” Paasch says.



The near-miss with the Wallonian veto plunged Belgium into a mini political crisis that ricocheted into the neverending debate on constitutional reform. Some would like to put the devolution genie back in the bottle and return powers to the centre.

Meanwhile, the people of the newly christened Ostbelgien take the name in their stride. “It doesn’t change anything, it is only marketing,” says a local newsagent.