2,500 sign expat vote petition ahead of Flagey meeting

More than 2,500 people have signed a petition calling for non-Belgians to be given the right to vote in Brussels regional elections.

The 1 Brusseleir 1 Vote campaign reached the milestone as it prepares to host its first Citizens' Meeting at Flagey on Wednesday evening "with the the firm intention of giving the right to vote to all Brusselsers".

The next regional elections are on 26 May 2019. The petition at Change.org says: "Today one in three Brussels-Capital adult residents - or 310,000 people - are denied the right to vote, and are prevented from taking an active political role, because they are non-Belgian.

"Yet they are Brussels residents like everyone else, who live, love, work, study, pay taxes and contribute in so many ways to make Brussels-Capital a better home for all."

Foreigners can register to vote in this October's municipal elections, but campaigners say this is not enough "because it is fragmented across the 19 communes. It is at the level of the Brussels-Capital region that residents' life is really organised and that significant decisions and policy-making take place".