Belgium's new Miss reflects country's political divisions

An odd title for a piece perhaps, but there's surely a good deal of truth to it.

If France thought it had problems choosing a Miss to represent it at upcoming international beauty pageants, then surely they pale in significance when compared to those of its smaller northeastern neighbour Belgium.

Miss Belgium 2011, Justine De Jonckheere (screenshot from an interview on RTL-TVi)

The election as Miss Belgium of 18-year-old Justine De Jonckheere from the town of Wevelgem in West Flanders earlier this month seems to underline, as far as some of her competitors from the French-speaking part of country are apparently concerned, the linguistic disparities that exist among the population of almost 11 million people.

All right, so that might be putting the matter a little strongly, but for Lucie Demaret, the candidate from the French-speaking province of Hainaut, the competition was unfairly weighted towards representatives from Dutch-speaking Flanders.

And when the jury composed of, what the certainly not unbiased French language regional Belgian daily La Nouvelle Gazette pointed out to its readers, five Dutchophones and two Francophones announced the final five whose names would be put forward to a public vote, it was "obvious" to Demaret that the competition had been "fixed".

"I immediately understood their strategy," the 22-year-old, described by the paper as a "multilingual political science student with a dream figure", said.

"They simply eliminated the candidate who could overshadow Justine De Jonckheere."

That was a point of view shared by another French-speaking contestant, Lara Binet.

As Miss Liège she reportedly won the text message vote from viewers and was entitled to an automatic place in the final five.

But she too was eliminated and, according to another French language daily in Belgium, La Dernière Heure, her family has accused the organising committee of cheating.

That's a claim the president of the organising committee, Darline Devos, rejects.

She said the competition reflected "the diversity that exists within Belgium" and insists the winner was elected according to the rules.

"Nobody can 'buy' the title," she told the French-speaking Belgian website L'Avenir.

"It's not 'for sale', and I simply wish the best contestant is elected Miss Belgium."

Now this might all seem like "handbags at dawn" stuff. But there is a serious side to it as the French national daily Le Monde points out.

It is, suggests the paper, just another example of the problems Belgium is currently facing with not even a beauty contest being "immune".

In other words, as incredible as it might seem, the election of a new Miss somehow reflects the country's political divisions.

Not so far fetched perhaps given the fact that Belgium has been without an elected government since June last year and there is currently a political stalemate which the BBC (among others) puts down to growing divisions between the Dutch-speaking Flemish majority (just over six million) and the French-speaking Walloon minority (just over three million).

Justine De Jonckheere : Miss Belgique 2011 Vidéo Video-i-Buzz sélectionnée dans Actualité