Bart De Wever wants to cut international solidarity even more
October 15 2025
2 minutes
Leaked information about the budget negotiations shows that Prime Minister Bart De Wever wants to slash the development cooperation budget: half of the original budget.
A cutback in solidarity in the midst of war, climate disruption and humanitarian disasters.
There was already practically nothing left to cut. Yet, De Wever wants to cut further. What's now being proposed is a heavy blow that will set us further on Trump's course—away from international cooperation, toward isolationism and indifference. It promises false security, but causes real damage in the short and long term.
Anyone who opens a newspaper or scrolls through social media today will see the reality: towering needs, shattered livesFrom Gaza to Congo, from Afghanistan to the Philippines. While children in vulnerable countries are starving, the prime minister wants to cut food aid. While women in Congo are fighting against sexual violence, he wants to cut the few resources that protect them. In such a world, advocating for less solidarity isn't neutral. It's a choice—against human lives.
It is a conscious choice: more money for weapons and tax breaks, but saving livesWhen the Trump administration implemented cuts to development aid, studies from The Lancet showed that this would lead to 14 million additional deaths by 2030, including 4,5 million children under the age of five. That is the price of ideological coldness and the abandonment of empathy.
When budgets shrink, lines on paper don't simply disappear. Vaccines are disappearing. Health centers. Schools. Lives. Investing less in solidarity means: more deaths from preventable diseases, more children without education, more women without protection from sexual violence, more inhumane working conditions, more people on the run.
At a time when human rights are under unprecedented attack, the Prime Minister actively puts forward policy choices that only fan the flames.
Belgian development cooperation works. It saves lives. It strengthens health systems. It promotes education, democracy, and stability. It makes societies resilient to climate change and prevents crises from spiraling out of control. It defends fundamental human rights—exactly what's needed today.
11.11.11 calls on Vooruit, CD&V and Les Engagés to choose: Between destruction or reconstruction. Between cooperation or isolation. Between saving lives—or saving them.
