Vooruit chairman Melissa Depraetere does not think that her party waited too long to call the statements for which Tom Meeuws resigned racist. She said this in an interview on Radio 1, after Vooruit had received similar criticism as when Conner Rousseau made his sensational statements.
Vooruit chairman Melissa Depraetere received some criticism after she only responded for the first time on Monday after the fuss surrounding former Antwerp alderman Tom Meeuws. Some time ago he had called his N-VA colleague Nabilla Ait Daoud “mocroships”, and it turned out not to be his only controversial statement. But the national department of Vooruit remained silent for a week. This brings back memories of the fuss surrounding Conner Rousseau, who also made statements that were only called racist by Vooruit after a long time.
“Tom Meeus is not a racist, but has made racist statements. That’s not appropriate. I called him very quickly, and the local department had already done that. It is not necessary to address someone with an origin, you can also do that with their name,” Depraetere has now repeated on Radio 1.
She dismisses the fact that her response took a long time. “Of course you want an interview immediately, but as national chairman I have to contact my department first, instead of giving all kinds of opinions in the press. There was an immediate meeting and I spoke internally with Tom. I think it is my job as chairman to first talk to the department in Antwerp and my people. I did call this racist. But first allow me to sit down with the people there to find out exactly what happened.”
Doesn’t this reflect negatively on the party? “There has certainly been a response from the party. But I wanted to speak to my people first before I went to the press myself.” She also dismisses the idea that the atmosphere within the Antwerp department is “toxic”. “The party has many strong people there. And it is no secret that there are clashes between leaders.”
Depraetere goes to Antwerp on Thursday. “When a leader stops, it raises a lot of questions among the people there. I want to give them answers about what happened and discuss with them how we approach the elections.”
