Pierre Kompany, “First Black mayor of Belgium”
Before anything else, Pierre Kompany is a courageous man. A man of integrity, too, who can make a difference in Belgian politics.
8 min readOct 24, 2018
Shortly after his election as mayor of Ganshoren, a Brussels municipality, Pierre Kompany retweeted this tweet :
It is, of course, true that Kompany is the first black mayor in Belgium — but maybe, with white Belgians of Tintin country, this should trigger some serious self-reflection, rather than this airy euphoria that seems to breeze through at least the liberal population of the country.
Here we are, in nearly 2019, and contrary to everything our common humanity could have hoped for, the colour of Pierre Kompany’s skin is the newsworthy item — even for the New York Times :
