The French Community of Belgium ( French Communauté française de Belgique ) is one of the three language communities in Belgium along with the Flemish and German-speaking communities. The French community includes Wallonia with a population of about 4.2 million people, excluding only the eastern regions where German is spoken, and the Brussels-capital region ( French Région Bruxelles-Capitale ) with a population of 1.1 million people. The area is 16 151 km².
Content
Title
The official name of the community raises a lot of complaints, since it does not quite correspond to the essence: the current name literally means "the community of French living in Belgium." A more correct name would be “Francophone community”. The government of the community more often calls it the “Community of Wallonia and Brussels ” ( French Communauté Wallonie-Bruxelles ) [1] , but this name is not fixed in the legislation and also does not quite correspond to reality, since the German-speaking region is located on the territory of Wallonia, to which the French communities are not distributed, and in Brussels, in addition to French, the Flemish community also operates. Attempts to approve the new name, undertaken in May 2011 , met resistance due to these reasons [2] .
Authority
The community has the following powers:
- education (with the exception of academic degrees)
- culture and language issues
- French-language television and radio broadcasting
- sport
- healthcare
- youth policy
Geographically, the French community includes Wallonia (excluding German-speaking areas) and the Brussels-capital region. At the same time, in Brussels, the authority of the French community extends only to French-speaking institutions, and Dutch-speaking institutions are the responsibility of the Flemish (Dutch-speaking) community.
Government and Parliament
The French community is independent of the Walloon region (unlike the Flemish community, which is combined with the Flemish region). The French community has its own parliament ( French Parlement de la Communauté française de Belgique ), consisting of 94 deputies. Community MPs are not specifically elected; concurrently, 73 of the 75 deputies of the Walloon Parliament (with the exception of two German-speaking deputies, instead of whom the French-speaking members of the same parties receive mandates in the French community parliament) and 19 (of 72) French-speaking members of the Parliament of the Brussels-Capital Region , who are elected by their deputies from their rows. The community also has its own government. Minister President - Rudi Demotte (since March 2008 ).
Unlike Wallonia, whose capital is Namur , the capital of the French community is Brussels , in which its authorities are located.
Notes
- ↑ La nouvelle Fédération Wallonie-Bruxelles défraye la chronique (French) . La Libre Belgique (05/05/201). Date of treatment April 15, 2012. Archived May 31, 2012.
- ↑ Peeters erkent Federatie Wallonië-Brussel niet (nid.) . De Standaard (25 mei 2011). Date of treatment April 15, 2012. Archived May 31, 2012.
Links
- Fédération Wallonie-Bruxelles (Fr.) . Date of treatment April 15, 2012. Archived May 15, 2012.
- Parlement de la Fédération Wallonie-Bruxelles (French) . Date of treatment April 15, 2012. Archived May 15, 2012.
- Gouvernement de la Fédération Wallonie-Bruxelles (French) . Date of treatment April 15, 2012. Archived May 15, 2012.