Committee for the Abolition of Illegitimate Debt

Question: why do right-wing and extreme-right-wing voters vote contrary to their own interests?

The demagogic rhetoric of right-wing leaders, with slogans such as ‘you will earn €500 more’, etc., is accepted because of a lack of political awareness and public insight caused in particular by the sheer repetition of this type of false claim. Right-wing parties won the elections in Belgium in June 2024 with this type of populist rhetoric.

We know that there will an enormous gap between the electoral proclamations and promises cried out by the right-wingers and what they end up doing. In the meantime, they have won the election. Unfortunately, the public and the right-wing party’s electoral base will only start to realise that they have been duped after about a year or year and a half into the mandate. Political awareness, clairvoyance, and perception take time to develop.

“There is a great disappointment with the traditional left that made promises of social justice but once elected pursued policies that differed little from those of the conservatives.”

It must be added that there is a great disappointment with the traditional left that made promises of social justice but once elected pursued policies that differed little from those of the conservatives. What’s more, above and beyond the proclamations of the left the public does not perceive changes in the policies they apply. Consequently, a sector of the electorate that seek change and lean to the right come out to vote and the sector that would defend the principles of justice and social progress stay home on election day. This is eventually to the favour of extreme-right parties and Belgium is now in that eventuality.

Question: nevertheless, over the last twenty years we have seen the PTB rise from less than 5% to nearly 17%. The disappointed left voters have rallied to a more radical left.

Yes, quite right. Yes, I think that PTB’s (Workers’ Party of Belgium, PTB-PVDA) results in Wallonia, Brussels and Flanders show very clearly that voters who voted for the Flemish socialists (the Voruit party today) and the Walloon socialists have been disappointed by this family of socialists and so taken their votes to the PTB. It is also clear that the radicality of the declarations of Paul Magnette has attracted them. The Socialist Party is aware that a very large part of the population desires justice, desires solidarity and is attached to public services and social values. Paul Magnette, as President of the PS, is aware of all of this and adapts his discourse—somewhat more radical than the discourses of other European socialists— in consequence. For example of comparison, Paul Magnette’s discourse is more radical than that of the Labour Party in England or of the Socialist Parties in France, Germany or Holland. Paul Magnette perceives this pressure that you mention, that is, the growth or consolidation/stabilisation of a vote favourable to the positions of the PTB.

Question : how do you see the future? Because at first sight, even if in Flanders it is felt that purchasing power has been eroded, I can’t see Flanders leaning 50% or more to the left in coming elections. Right-wing parties will still be present in the federal government and we have seen that even though the left be present too, that has not prevented the right from advancing its austerity agendas. Are you optimistic or do you think that unfortunately austerity will continue?

Those who suffer continually and consistently because of the social and economic situation may seek radical change and turn their regard to the extreme right.

Unfortunately, at the moment the conclusions are pessimistic or worrying. We must be aware of the looming dangers. That certainly worries me and should worry anybody who observes the situation. If the despair of the sectors of the population who are already the most affected by the contraction of their living conditions and exclusion from rights and benefits increases, the question that arises is: do the right and the neo-fascists not find this situation of population despair favourable to them? Logically the answer is yes. Those who suffer continually and consistently because of the social and economic situation may seek radical change and turn their regard to the extreme right. There is real danger here.

But for me, there is no question of giving up and considering that rien ne va plus and the die is cast.

In the 1950s Belgium renewed its social and economic structures, developed public investment and promoted a truth campaign on the national budget.

If there were a social bloc around this issue, bringing together trade unions, political parties and citizens’ associations, social movements, feminist, anti-racist, internationalist and eco-socialist organisations, positive solutions could be found.

I hope that an alternative alliance of different tendencies may be created, bringing together the Green party, the Socialist party, and PTB, along with other sectors of the left that are not represented in Parliament, and the big trade unions. It could also include other social movements: anti-racists, anti-fascists, feminists, LGBTQI+... , etc. It is necessary to build a politico-social bloc capable of making propositions, capable of saying “we have solutions”, capable of building a truth campaign and calling out demonstrations. In the 1950s Belgium renewed its social and economic structures, developed public investment and promoted a truth campaign on the national budget.

If there were a political and social bloc around this issue, bringing together trade unions, political parties, civic associations, social movements, feminist organisations, anti-racist groups, internationalists and eco-socialists, positive solutions could be found.

The danger of a prolonged victory for the far right could be avoided. But I cannot reasonably claim, given that there is no such bloc at the moment, that this will be possible. I think we need to work towards this, and if it were to happen, such a bloc would have enormous appeal and credibility. This would require putting forward a genuine programme of structural change and not just promising an end to neoliberalism.

To say that an electoral victory is possible we must look to the campaign by the radical socialist Bernie Sanders in the USA in 2015-2016 for the Democratic nomination before he was replaced by Hilary Clinton to face Donald Trump. Trump was elected because Hilary Clinton represented the continuation of the usual Democrat policies. She was part of the establishment and the elite. In 2024 it was Joe Biden, then Kamala Harris, who Trump beat to achieve a second term in office as President of the United States of America. He won the second term because the Democrat candidates would not adopt a left-wing programme that could satisfy the majority of the electorate who suffered from the effects of the crisis. Bernie Sanders’s platform is the one that might have won the elections against Trump. The demonstration of this is made clear by Zohran Mamdani’s victory in the New York mayoral elections in November 2025.

Zohran Mamdani won the New York city municipal elections with a million votes against Andrew Cuomo (former Democratic governor of the State of New York), who was endorsed by Donald Trump and the establishment, on 5 November 2025. Mamdani (34) is Muslim born in Uganda. In his victory speech he is noted to have said, in defiance of Trump “New York will remain a city of immigrants: a city built by immigrants, powered by immigrants and, as of tonight, led by an immigrant.”

Among Mamdani’s propositions, that gained him enormous support are: freezing the rents on one million homes; increasing State corporation tax from 7.5% to 11.5%i on New York State based companies, in line with the State of New Jersey, aiming to raise $5 billion p/a in tax revenues; a surtax of 2% on revenues above $1 million; free public transport on the buses.

Trump threatened New Yorkers who wanted to vote for the ‘leftist’ Mamdani with cutting federal funding to the city. This did not deter a million people from voting for him. No elected Mayor of New York City has won so many votes since 1969.

On the west coast of the USA Katie Wilson (43) was elected mayor of Seattle on 4^th November 2025. This port city of 800,000 inhabitants has been a Democrat stronghold for decades, but this time is different.

Mother of a two-year-old daughter, she does not own a car and lives in a rented 55m² (550 sq. ft.) flat. The new Mayor of Seattle is militant and activist and she based her election campaign on the same themes as Mamdani: the housing crisis and increasing inequality. The incumbent Mayor, Bruce Harrell who had the support of local business, seemed sure to win. Katie Wilson challenged him on his opposition to a tax on high incomes destined to finance social housing. The radical socialist Katie Wilson had never before held an elected post of authority.

Another positive note in the Irish Presidential elections held on 24^th October 2025;: Catherine Connolly, a candidate with the support of all the left, was elected

Another recent positive note in the Irish Presidential elections held on 24^th October 2025:; Catherine Connolly, a candidate with the support of all the left, was elected. She opposes Ireland’s membership in NATO NATO
North Atlantic Treaty Organization NATO ensures US military protection for the Europeans in case of aggression, but above all it gives the USA supremacy over the Western Bloc. Western European countries agreed to place their armed forces within a defence system under US command, and thus recognize the preponderance of the USA. NATO was founded in 1949 in Washington, but became less prominent after the end of the Cold War. In 2002, it had 19 members: Belgium, Canada, Denmark, France, Iceland, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, the UK, the USA, to which were added Greece and Turkey in 1952, the Federal Republic of Germany in 1955 (replaced by Unified Germany in 1990), Spain in 1982, Hungary, Poland and the Czech Republic in 1999. and the militarisation of the European Union. She supports the cause of immigrants and denounces the genocide in Gaza. She defends public services and promotes a programme of building social housing for the popular classes. See: Catherine Connolly wins: An historic victory for the left

We can also mention the excellent result of the New Popular Front (Nouveau Front Populaire) in France in the anticipated legislative elections in June 2024. Their more firmly radical programme stressed the necessity to break away from the economic model applied by the EU. It insisted on tax increases applied to the richest in order to increase revenues and abolishing tax breaks to the rich and to the biggest companies.

Question : what is to be done In Belgium
I think that a left programme should start with what the population is actually living. Good quality, socially useful and better paid jobs must be created and in good working conditions. higher revenues, a radical reduction of working hours with new compensated jobs to replace them entirely. New fiscal policies are necessary including reduction, and even abolition, of VAT on basic services such a electricity and water supply – and a radical increase in the taxation of the incomes and estates of the wealthiest. This is also a response, through revenue, to part of the issue raised by public debt.

A fair taxation programme should not be used to repay illegitimate debts

However, there is one major difference compared to a social democracy programme: a fair taxation programme should not be used to repay illegitimate debts.

There is a dramatisation of the debt issue, which we must denounce. We are not facing the prospect of collapse or an inability to repay. What is needed from the left point of view is a government that would declare, on the basis of a citizen-participatory debt audit, that part of the public debt is illegitimate or even odious, and that a significant portion of it must be cancelled. We would like to see a left-wing government implementing policies that favour the population and making huge public investments in the fight against the ecological crisis, take such a decision.

Mention must be made of the interest of the collective call in the Brussels region. See: « il faut une mobilisation générale pour déjouer le piège de l’austérité ».(in French)

Increased receipts are to enable increased legitimate spending, not to repay illegitimate public debts. Legitimate spending to be financed by the increased tax revenues from the wealthiest must be directed towards improving the living conditions of the popular classes, and increase public spending tied to the struggle against the ecological crisis. Enormous investments are necessary in public transport, renovating and isolating homes, scientific research, withdrawing from nuclear energy and a whole host of other socially useful projects that will create good jobs in short supply chains. It is necessary to improve public services with massive job creations, particularly in health, education and culture. We must not forget the experience of the COVID pandemic that produced an awareness of the importance of public health and the fact that Big Pharma is not capable, or interested, at all in responding to the needs of the populations.

We must, by expropriation and socialisation, transfer strategic sectors of the economy to the public domain. The energy sector for example must be expropriated to be managed publicly. Banking and insurance must become public socialised monopolies. The health and welfare sector likewise.

We must, by expropriation and socialisation, transfer strategic sectors of the economy to the public domain
We must repeal a series of one-sided treaties that the European Union has imposed on Southern countries – treaties that, in the dogma of free trade, disadvantage the Southern countries – and thus introduce unbalanced trade relations.

Candidate immigrants, by whatever means they arrive on the territory, deserve to be received in humane, dignified and respectful conditions.

The relationship between the North – for example the European Union – and the peoples of the South must change, particularly in terms of migration policy. Development aid must be replaced by reparations to be paid to the peoples of the South and the restitution of assets illicitly acquired by the North at the expense of the populations of the South.

There is also the question of the arms industry: The left must wage a struggle against increases in arms spending and defence industries should also be placed under public control and strongly regulated. Social progress must be accompanied with an energetic international diplomatic initiatives in favour of disarmament.

These are the absolutely fundamental elements of any left-wing programme.