Flemish separatists have once again emerged as the largest force in Belgian politics following national parliamentary elections on Sunday, with over 95% of votes counted.
The conservative New Flemish Alliance (N-VA) is projected to come first with 17% of the vote, while the more extreme Vlaams Belang (Flemish Interest) is expected win the second largest share of the vote with 14%.
The Dutch-speaking Flemish are the majority in Belgium, but the electoral system is engineered to ensure a balance of power between French and Dutch-speaking regions. With seat projections still changing by the minute, it's not yet clear whether Vlaams Belang will have more seats in the Chamber of Representatives than the French-speaking liberal Reformist Movement (MR).
In a national vote held the same day as the European Parliament elections, Prime Minister Alexander de Croo's Flemish liberal party, Open VLD, is projected to lose almost half its seats in Chamber of Representatives. As is traditional after elections, Prime Minister Alexandre De Croo is expected to resign on Monday, Belgian media reported on Sunday.
The N-VA and Vlaams Belang also the largest and second-largest share of the vote, respectively, in the last federal elections held in 2019. Both are projected to have increased their vote share, with Vlaams Belang potentially gaining two seats and the N-VA currently projected to lose one.
The two parties are currently in opposition: despite their size as individual parties, they were outnumbered in the outgoing chamber by a coalition of seven non-separatist parties: OpenVLD, the MR, the Flemish centre-right Christian Democrats (CD&V), and the Flemish and francophone socialist and green parties.
That so-called "Vivaldi coalition" - a reference to the Italian composer's Four Seasons - took a year and a half to form.
In the French-speaking south, the Socialist Party (PS) and the MR are projected to be neck-and-neck in terms of vote share, with around 9.5% each, but the MR is projected to win more seats than the PS, whereas the reverse was true in 2019.
