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I’ve been here in Belgium for one week right now, and the news has been focussing on the formation of the new government. New? Well, the Prime Minister and the Minister of Justice have been changed, one other Minister has resigned as well, and now the Belgian government can go on governing, as nothing has happened. No new elections, just business as usual. And while the new government has only been in office since yesterday, plans are already being made for new changes. Our current Minister of Foreign Affairs is planning to become a Secretary of whatever kind of department in the European Government by the end of 2009, and plans are that Yves Leterme will get his current job. The most incapable Prime Minister of the Belgian government in history has only been away for a little over one week, and he’s already back in the spotlights! I thought, maybe a little naively, that politics and politicians should be focussing on improving the life of the people in a region, a country, the world… Apparently, the majority of them are focussing on their own lives and jobs…

We have started the last day of 2008 right now. Time for looking back? Is it necessary? While change has come for the United States when early November, a dream finally came true after four and a half decades, the world has not become a better place to live in over the past year. Too many crimes against humanity are being committed each and every day.

The Middle East for example, where I have never seen a month of peace in my whole life! Eastern Congo, where millions of people have already died over the past decade. Afghanistan, where no foreign nation EVER has won a war. Irak. Georgia last summer. I don’t want to carry on. It makes me too sad. And I am not a negative person, I am not a pessimist.

So let’s focus on the future. Let’s hope Barack Obama will be able to change a couple of things, in the first place for his country where God blesses oh so many things… And maybe, just maybe, politicians of the rest of the world will learn a little from him.

Let’s try together to turn 2009 into the best year ever!

Happy New Year!

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Since last night, I am back in Belgium. I had not been here for quite some time, and actually, it’s good to be back. Especially to realise again what I have been missing since my move to Portugal, a little over five years ago. The grey and cold weather for example! It’s fucking freezing cold over here! Well, this might be a little exaggerated, but … I’ve only been here for about 18 or 19 hours, and I am already beginning to really miss the blue Algarvian skies and the sunshine. It is, I must admit, an incredible luxury to be able to wake up in the morning, and see the deep dark blue sky and the sun shining over the landscape.

Being back over here, I took the advantage to buy a couple of Belgian newspapers and magazines, things I don’t have down south. With a lot of amusement, I read the articles about the political crisis, and the (non) solutions to it. I wonder if our King Albert II has read the article I wrote last Sunday? In my humble opinion, the fastest solution to this incredible crisis is to address the older generation of politicians, the experienced guys. Guess what? Last Monday, he asked former Prime Minister Wilfried Martens, aged 72, to try to find a way out of this crisis.

Apparently, a lot of political commentators do not agree with this choice. I wonder why? The current generation of politicians (unfortunately - and I am not proud of that - this is my generation as well) over here have been fighting and struggling for the last eighteen months, and have shown over and over again their incapability of leading this country.

I can only agree with our King Albert’s choice, despite the fact that I do not belong to the political family of Mr. Martens. But let’s give him the benifice of the doubt.

On the other hand, I honestly believe that the press is sometimes playing a very dangerous role as well. Not only while commenting live on the political discussions, but also on some other topics regarding national security. To my big astonishment, Belgian television stations broadcasted images of our Queen Paola, leaving and returning her palace, while driving all alone in a small white Italian brand new Fiat 500. Queen Paola was born in Italy, and apparently still loves the Italian way of life. But… does the press realise that also terrorists are watching their programs? Do they realise that also people with not so good intentions are watching?

This would be unthinkable on the other side of the pond. While Barack Obama and his family are having a well deserved holiday on the Hawaian islands staying in one or the other villa, each and every car is searched of all his “neighbours” when they are entering their street. And over here, journalists are just broadcasting these images, even displaying the license number of her car.

Maybe the current generation of journalists are suffering from the same syndromes as the current generation of politicians? I can only hope that some day, some real people with real responsability will stand up again.

Anyway, I wish you all a very Merry Christmas.

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I am flying back to Belgium tonight. My business in Portugal has literally stopped since last weekend. No more e-mails, no more phone calls, no more visitors in the business… Very, very weird. I sent out a card with Christmas and New Years wishes yesterday. I did it by e-mail. It is incredible how many “out-of-office” replies I received immediately following my e-mail. And while my business has stopped, the shopping mall in Faro is busy as I’ve never seen it in the five and a half years I’ve been living in this country. I wanted to have lunch over there today, but the traffic jam to the Faro shopping center made me think of the daily traffic jams in Belgium, caused by people trying to get into Brussels. So I went to another restaurant a little further down the road. Every year, I am astonished how my business comes to an end so suddenly. And it’ll stay calm until after January 6th…

Another thing that astonishes me almost each and every day is the stupidity of some people. The other day, I met an elderly Irishman. He told me he will never trust any GPS-system anymore, no matter how long he will live. What had happened? He had to drive back to Ireland, after having lived over here in the Portuguese Algarve for quite some years. So he was scheduled to take a ferry in Boulogne, in the northern part of France. So he put in his destination, and started driving, going north, through Portugal, Spain, France and finally … ended up in Bologna, Italy.

Had he learned another language than English, he would have realised he was heading the wrong direction!

Anyway, if I am not back before Christmas, I hope you’ll have a very good one!

Merry Christmas!

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The end has finally come for Belgian Yves Leterme’s first government. He won the elections in June 2007 with an overwhelming 800.000 votes, so he was bound to become the Prime Minister of a government that didn’t really get to a start. It was only some time in December of last year, when he had given in his resignation for the second time to King Albert II, that his predecessor Guy Verhofstadt had to put an urgency government together for three months, freeing the roads for Leterme, who finally became the Prime Minister in March of this year. A job he couldn’t handle. I believe it was in the summer of this year that he put in his resignation for the third time. And last Friday, he finally threw the towel again. It seems unthinkable that the King will not accept this resignation for the fourth time. So he’s out.

It must be hard for the man. I didn’t like him at all, because I knew from the very start in June of last year that he would not be able to run the country. But his ambition made him lose a lot of things: credibility, friends (although I really doubt it that there are friends in politics), but above all his health. I honestly believe the end of his political career has come. While he’s even younger than I am, about six months or so.

What now? New elections for the European and Regional parliament are going to be held in June of next year. The political situation in Belgium is far too complex to be explained in a couple of simple words, but they should organise new elections by then for the Federal Government as well. And until then, why not ask a couple of elderly politicians, guys who have been retired, to come back and lead the country for the next six months? It might seem a stupid idea, but during this worst economic crisis in human history, a country needs good leadership. Maybe now is the time for the King to call in his “Crown Council”, a group of statesmen that can assist the King in difficult times. I believe the last time a Belgian King called that council together was during or just after the second World War. But hey, don’t we live in a time of crisis again?

In less than a month, Barack Obama will have been installed as the 44th President of the United States. He as well won the November elections with a big majority. He is maybe the most popular man on this globe right now. I can only hope he will be able to fulfill the goals he has set. He has already announced that the road will be difficult and long. Let’s hope the American public will not turn against him, when this economic situation will not end soon.

After all, wasn’t President George Bush Senior very popular when he had won the first Gulf War? We all know that his popularity went down like a rock a couple of years later…

But I guess the American leadership is more adult than the Belgian kids that have been trying to run my home country for the last nine months.

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Sometimes, being a Belgian living abroad is not easy. Especially when my foreign friends over here are asking questions about the very peculiar Belgian political situation. It seems a never ending story, but over and over again, I have to explain to them what kind of actions our incapable Belgian politicians are taking while trying to run my home country. I am not a lawyer, and I have never studied the law very well, but I know a little bit about it. The least thing I expect is that people running a country know the law as well. And if not, they should be surrounded by very capable lawyers who’s job it is to protect these politicians against themselves.

Since two days, Belgium is again in crisis. Or should I say… the crisis has become worse? Since the June 2007 elections, Belgium has seen the worst crisis in its history. And since March of this year, Belgium has the most incapable Prime Minister in its history as well. Yves Leterme went to the elections with one slogan: “Who believes these people?” Giving critics on his opponent and his liberal party.

Crembo, our Minister of Defense has been very quiet over the last couple of weeks, since he was spotted being drunk in the New York bar and since he was overwhelmed by reactions after having called bloggers as being dangerous species. Last week, the Minister of Justice has put himself above the law, while he had to cover up mistakes that had been made by people working in jail. A decision the whole country could approve of. But yes, a little against the law. What had happened?

A young female police officer was killed in December last year in a gunfight while doing her job. A couple of weeks later, the murderers were arrested and have been in jail since then. One of these killers had appealed against a court’s decision to keep him in jail, and due to some incredible mistake, these papers were lost! Officially, he had to be released out of prison, he was to become a free man again. Fortunately, the Justice Department found another reason to keep this gangster in jail. If he had been freed, it would have been just another scandal on top of all the rest.

This week however, in the Fortis saga - the biggest Belgian bank that was sold by the government to the Dutch and the French, the goverment interfeared with the Justice department and tried to influence the court to have a verdict in its favor. The court overruled these interventions, the press found out, the crisis became worse, and normally, Yves Leterme should resign from his office. That’s the normal thing to do as Prime Minister.

Not in Belgium however! While I had expected to see him resign from his office, he simply continues. As if nothing has happened.

I can only ask one question: “Who believes Yves Leterme?”

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This country is not one of the richest in Europe. As a matter of fact, the economy is going backwards, and due to some of the politicians running this country, Portugal is becoming poorer and poorer. I like to think of myself that I am an intelligent man. And yet, sometimes there are things happening in this country that I really do not understand. I was in Leiria last weekend, doing some business meetings in that area, the center of Portugal.

I have been there many times over the past five years. I specifically remember one Friday evening some time in the fall of 2003. It might have been winter, I can’t remember the exact date, but I had been living here very shortly. I had been working and prospecting in the beautiful Porto region for a couple of days, and was driving back to the Algarve at the end of that working week. It was raining cats and dogs, driving conditions were really terrible, it was about 10.00pm and I was in the Santarem region, about 100 kilometers north of Lisbon. I needed to get back to the Algarve that night, as I had some business meetings scheduled the next Saturday morning and after all, it was only another 400 kilometers of driving (no wonder that I had a heart-attack on my 46st birthday - now I don’t do this anymore!)! I did not have a GPS system in my car at that time, but I had a brand new map! I had taken a close look at it, and had seen a motorway besides the A1, going south from Santarem, which would not take me into Lisbon. I saw it was a kind of a shortcut, so the choice was easy: I was going on that motorway.

I left the A1, and headed a little east on a national road, being sure to find that new motorway. Thirty kilometers down that road, I discovered that the new one was still in construction, so I had to turn back, and get back on the A1 that took me to Lisbon, and then further down to the Algarve.

The following times I was heading north, I took the new one until about 30 kilometers north of Lisbon, where I took another national road for about 15 kilometers to take me back to the A1. But I did not have to pass Lisbon, which was an advantage. The new motorway only got finished about two years ago. It is a beautiful road, and everytime I am on that one, I am all alone. Almost no other traffic on it! It’s a pleasure to drive a car on these kind of motorways.

Last Saturday, I was on that one again. All of a sudden, about halfway that road, I saw a sign for another new motorway, taking me to the A1. As I am sometimes a bit curious, and I like to discover new things, I really discovered something new. Another brand new motorway had opened again. A motorway? No, it’s a twenty kilometers long bridge, with three lanes in each direction. Millions, probably billions of euros have been spent on that new road starting in Alenquer, and heading east.

I asked myself why that was necessary? When I was on that new road last Saturday and Sunday afternoon, I was literally the ONLY driver on it! Billions of euros have been spent by the Portuguese government for letting me drive on that beautiful piece of architecture.

I can’t stop thinking that some businessmen, builders, architects AND politicians who approved to build this rediculous new motorway have received a hell of a lot of euros in their pockets.

This all is taking place in this beautiful country, in the early years of the 21st century! What a shame!

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On normal days, I receive a whole lot of e-mails. Some are for business reasons, some are private e-mails, and a lot of the e-mails I am receiving are mails that are just being passed on to the next e-mail address owner. Some are funny, others are just rubbish. And very rarely, among these e-mails, there is one that makes me think about the content. The story which is following, was sent to me, and somehow staid in my mind. It comes from a Canadian woman that speaks her mind… well, I just like it, and instead of just forwarding it to my e-mail contacts, I am putting it over here. The story she’s tellling applies not only to Canada, the U.S.A, U.K or Australia, but to the major part of the Western world. Maybe she should get involved into politics, so that real action is taken!

Are we fighting a war on terror or aren’t we? Was it or was it not started by Islamic people who brought it to our shores on September 11, 2001 and have continually threatened to do so since?

Were people from all over the world, not brutally murdered that day, in downtown Manhattan, across the Potomac from the nation’s capitol and in a field in Pennsylvania?

Did nearly three thousand men, women and children die a horrible, burning or crushing death that day, or didn’t they?

And I’m supposed to care that a few Taliban were claiming to be tortured by a justice system of the nation they come from and are fighting against in a brutal insurgency.

I’ll start caring when Osama bin Laden turns himself in and repents for incinerating all those innocent people on 9/11.

I’ll care about the Koran when the fanatics in the Middle East start caring about the Holy Bible, the mere belief of which is a crime punishable by beheading in Afghanistan.

I’ll care when these thugs tell the world they are sorry for hacking off Nick Berg’s head while Berg screamed through his gurgling slashed throat.

I’ll care when the cowardly so-called ‘insurgents’ in Afghanistan come out and fight like men instead of disrespecting their own religion by hiding in mosques.

I’ll care when the mindless zealots who blow themselves up in search of nirvana care about the innocent children within range of their suicide bombs.

I’ll care when the Canadian media stops pretending that their freedom of speech on stories is more important than the lives of the soldiers on the ground or their families waiting at home to hear about them when something happens.

In the meantime, when I hear a story about a CANADIAN soldier roughing up an Insurgent terrorist to obtain information, know this:

I don’t care.

When I see a wounded terrorist get shot in the head when he is told not to move because he might be booby-trapped, you can take it to the bank:

I don’t care.

When I hear that a prisoner, who was issued a Koran and a prayer mat, and fed ’special’ food that is paid for by my tax dollars, is complaining that his holy book is being ‘mishandled,’ you can absolutely believe in your heart of hearts:

I don’t care.

And oh, by the way, I’ve noticed that sometimes it’s spelled ‘Koran’ and other times ‘Quran.‘ Well, Jimmy Crack Corn you guessed it,

I don’t care!!

If you agree with this viewpoint, pass this on to all your E-mail friends sooner or later, it’ll get to the people responsible for this ridiculous behavior!

If you don’t agree, then by all means hit the delete button. Should you choose the latter, then please don’t complain when more atrocities committed by radical Muslims happen here in our great Country! And may I add:

‘Some people spend an entire lifetime wondering if they made a difference in the world.

But the Soldiers don’t have that problem.’

I have another quote that I would like to add AND… I hope you forward all this.

One last thought for the day:

Only five defining forces have ever offered to die for you:

1. Jesus Christ

2. The Canadian Soldier.

3. The British Soldier.

4. The US Soldier, and

5. The Australian Soldier

One died for your soul, the other 4 for your freedom.

YOU MIGHT WANT TO PASS THIS ON, AS MANY SEEM TO FORGET ALL OF THEM.

I do agree with everything this woman is writing, except for the very last part. First of all, I don’t care about the guy who died about 2000 years ago, but it is not only Canada, the United States, the United Kingdom and Australia that have lost soldiers for our freedom. Believe it or not, also Belgians have given their lives. As have the Dutch, the French and far too many other countries.

So except for that, I totally agree.

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I received this clip a couple of days ago by a very special Canadian friend of mine. I sat back and enjoyed every second of it. I honestly hope you will have the same feelings about it.

Something to think about now that the holiday season is approaching so rapidly, while millions of people won’t have holidays…

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Does the Western world really care about the problems in Africa? Yesterday, the European Ministers of Foreign Affairs couldn’t come to an agreement to send in troops as a reinforcement for the Monuc Peace Keeping Force in Eastern Congo. Despite the fact that incredible cruel things are happening each and every day in that region. United Nation’s Secretary-General Ban Ki Moon has been pleading the European Union for help, the Belgian government is in favour for doing so, but, apparently, there is no enthusiasm within  Europe to help solve the problems over there. Can they really be solved? That’s the big question.

When I was travelling through that region in 1989, a lot of people of the older generation, locals who had lived when the “white man was ruling the country”, asked us when we would come to take it over again? “Because”, they said, “when you were the Bwanas (bosses) over here, we had education, we had public transportation, we had roads, we had health care, we had hospitals, we were happy…” Their words.

It hurts to see that a region that could be one of the richest in the world, has become one of the poorest in the same world. Ok, there is no oil in that area, but there are diamonds and many other minerals like cobalt and coltan which the Western world loves so much. And if the local people are not able to run their country themselves, shouldn’t we take our responsability to help them?

What strikes me as well is that there is absolutely no solidarity amongst the African countries as well. The Mugabes of the 21st century are only interested in robbing their countries and becoming as rich as possible themselves. Somalia, Darfur, Zimbabwe, the area of the great lakes in central Africa… all desperate places where human tragedies are happening each and every day.

But while the politicians are talking in the beautiful conference rooms of the world, women and young girls are being raped by soldiers. Rape is used as a weapon to destroy whole generations of fellow human beings.

One of the clips below was filmed in Bukavu, Eastern Congo, a city that I visited as well. A long time ago, this used to be one of the most modern cities in Africa, at the boarders of Lake Kivu, a beautiful area. Today, it has become a centre of horror.

When will we take action in order to help these people? After all, don’t we have a responsability as human beings?

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One of the most cruel places to go to nowadays is Eastern Congo. In the former Belgian colony, a very terrible war has been going on for quite some time now. A war which has already costed over five million lives. Every day, children are being killed, women are being raped, and men are being tortured to death. Tomorrow, the European Ministers of Foreign Affairs will gather together in Brussels to discuss this matter, one more time. Belgium, having a historical responsability with this African region, has been pleading for several weeks to send in a European peace-force, driven by the United Nations. Their Secretary-General Ban Ki Moon has been asking the same thing. But both France and the United Kingdom don’t want to engage their troops on this moment. They are being too engaged, too overstreched in Irak and Afghanistan, as they call it.

The United Nations want to strenghten the MONUC-peace-force with at least 3000 soldiers, and are searching these troups in Europe. With a budget of one billion US $, the MONUC force is the largest and most expensive mission in the U.N.’s Department of Peace Keeping Operations. But, the biggest problem is that the majority of these troops do come from the third world. As if the third world has to take care of its own, and the rich countries just don’t care.

It makes me sad when I see these terrible things happening today over there. About twenty years ago, I visited that region, and had an experience that I will never forget in this life. It was in the beginning of our trip, during the very first days, that we managed to go and see the gorillas living in the wild in the Virunga National Park. I remember that it was very difficult to make the reservations, and had it not been for some friends living in that area who helped me, I would never have seen them in their own habitat.

We left very early in the morning, driving through the wonderful morning landscape which made me feel like Sigourney Weaver in the 1988 movie Gorillas in the Mist. After a long drive, and an even longer walk through several hills, up and down, we finally discovered a whole family of these giant creatures. One of the guides had briefed us beforehand to take a low gesture when we were close to these animals.

Not this boy of course. Digital cameras hadn’t been invented yet, so I was standing there upright, carrying my heavy Nikon and shooting one role of film after the other. At maximum two meters away, the leader of the family, the enormous silver back gorilla was sitting on his ass, looking to me and to the guide (who he obviously recognised), as if he wanted to find out what this big white ape with a beard and a camera was doing… Really unforgettable.

Today, twenty years later, it is not only a human tragedy that is going on in that region. These wonderful animals are also in real danger.

So please, dear politicians, stop talking, and take some serious action. This cruelty has to come to an end. After all, you call yourselves civilised. It is time to prove it to the world. Take the action NOW, it is high time!

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