Anti-Good Move committees join forces to form 'Bad Move' collective

The various committees that oppose Brussels’ mobility plan Good Move have joined forces to create a website to house their grievances, called badmove.be.

Launched this week, the website is “an unfiltered place where we collect substantiated articles and figures,” Fouad El Abbouti, who co-initiated the website, told Bruzz.

The ‘Bad Move’ collective describes its members as “ordinary citizens from more than 10 communes in the Brussels region, apolitical and voluntary, who have decided not to let ourselves be pushed around.”

They say the capital’s mobility plan, which aims to combat air pollution and traffic jams while improving safety for non-motorists, is socially unjust.

“We want a real mobility policy, in which all citizens are involved,” the website states.

“We believe it is possible to do better than what is being proposed. It is even a duty, a moral, political, economic and social necessity. We cannot try to build a fairer world tomorrow by creating injustice today.”

The group takes particular issue with the term “car people”, making a point to include in their introduction that this is offensive and insulting. They also refer to a petition calling for more debate on the plan, which so far has collected 1,000 signatures.

“Some people think we have a 'hidden agenda', that we're going to get involved in politics,” the website says.

“But we're just doing what every citizen should be doing: monitoring the actions of our elected representatives and holding them to account for the way they honour the mandate we've given them. Obviously, they don't like it. They didn't think that we would seize the democratic instruments they created, thinking that nobody would use them.”

The group also lashed out at comments made by the mayor of Schaerbeek, who reportedly described the Bad Move collectives as ‘Trumpist’, in reference to former American president Donald Trump.

“We are nothing of the sort,” the Bad Move collective said.

The group's website houses a collection of articles criticising various aspects of Good Move, exclusively in French and all under the author ‘Le comité’.

“The intention is to publish articles in response to citizen interpellations, current events, or political news,” El Abbouti told Bruzz.

“Social media are hitting their limits and we noticed that in our project there was a need for overview and a central place. We want to offer as much info as possible – these are not opinion pieces. In addition, we will be able to reply to certain publications in the media.”

El Abbouti insists that while “the pieces we do show the positions around Good Move taken by political parties, at regional or municipal level,” it is not a political group and is not offering suggestions on who to vote for.

“The politicians are coming to the realisation that many Brussels citizens share: citizens must be included and consulted in the future elaboration of Good Move,” El Abbouti said.

“Let me repeat: we are not against ecological measures. But you have to bring Brussels residents from working-class neighbourhoods into that green story by at least involving them. That is what we want to do with this site, too.”