French Community of Belgium - Alternative Name

Alternative Name

There were since years hints that the Community wanted to evidence the link between Wallonia and Brussels, being the two main territories where the community exercises its competences, such as when it created Wallonie-Bruxelles International, a public body in charge with international cultural competences by the Community, the Walloon Region and the Commission communautaire française (COCOF, a French-speaking institution of the Brussels-Capital Region). The concept of "Wallonie-Bruxelles" is however not mentioned in the Belgian constitution, and appeared only in a few official legal texts, such as the "Arrêté du Gouvernement de la Communauté française fixant le code de qualité et de l'accueil" of 17 December 2003, mentioning the name "Communauté Wallonie-Bruxelles", and the "Arrêté du Gouvernement de la Communauté française approuvant le programme quinquennal de promotion de la santé 2004-2008 of 30 April 2004, mentioning the name "Communauté française Wallonie-Bruxelles".

In May 2011, the parliament of the Community voted a resolution according to which it would, from then on, use the name "Fédération Wallonie-Bruxelles" for all its communications, campaigns and in the administration. The move was immediately interpreted as aggressive by the Flemish authorities, the Minister-President of Flanders announcing he would not recognize the federation as an official body and saying that documents that would be sent by the federation would be unconstitutional and therefore would not exist.

While the authorities of the Community acknowledge the fact that the new name is not mentioned in the Belgian Constitution, they insist that their move is not illegal, as long as the new name is used as an additional name for the Community and is not used when it could create a legal issue (such as with the official texts published in the Belgian Official Journal)

Although the Belgian Prime Minister said that it would not use the new name and the Flemish VRT decided not to use the new name in its news programmes either, the new name is somewhat used in the French-speaking part of the country: it is used by the French-speaking RTBF, which is fully controlled by the Community, but is not always used in independent media.

In September 2011, the Community adopted a new logo that incorporates its new name.