Mouvement des Citoyens pour le Changement explained

Citizens' Movement for Change
Foundation:1998
Headquarters:Rue de la Vallée 50-1000, Brussels
Website:http://www.lemcc.be
Country:Belgium
Native Name:Mouvement des Citoyens pour le Changement
Leader1 Title:President
Leader1 Name:Gérard Deprez
Split:Christian Social Party
Position:Centre-right[1]
National:Reformist Movement
European:European Democratic Party
Seats1 Title:Chamber of Representatives
Seats2 Title:Senate
Seats3 Title:Walloon Parliament
Seats4 Title:Parliament of the French Community
Seats5 Title:Brussels Parliament
Seats6 Title:European Parliament
Colours: Turquoise

Citizens' Movement for Change (French: Mouvement des Citoyens pour le Changement, pronounced as /fr/, MCC) is a Christian-democratic[2] political party in the French Community of Belgium founded by Gérard Deprez in 1998.

Deprez was the leader of the Francophone Christian Social Party (PSC) from 1982 to 1995. He left the PSC, because he had failed to carry through his idea of forging a confederation of the PSC with the Liberal Reformist Party (PRL). Moreover, he had been discontent with the election of Charles-Ferdinand Nothomb as party leader.[3] The last trigger to form a new party was the popular outrage at the government's mishandling of the controversy around the pedophile serial killer Marc Dutroux. The MCC immediately joined the alliance of the PRL and the regionalist Democratic Front of the Francophones (FDF) and ran on a joint PRL-FDF-MCC list for the elections in 1999. Deprez was elected to the European Parliament and sat with the group of the European People's Party (EPP-ED). The MCC supported the "purple-green" government coalition of Liberals, Socialists and Greens, while the PSC, for the first time in 50 years, was sent into opposition. PRL, FDF and MCC became components of the Reformist Movement in 2002.

In the 2004 European Parliamentary Election it elected one MEP (G. Deprez) on the MR ticket. This time, he chose to sit with his liberal allies in the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe (ALDE) Group. The MCC became part of the pan-European European Democratic Party (EDP).

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Notes and References

  1. Web site: Die Themen populistischer Parteien aus rechts- und politikwissenschaftlicher Sicht – Länderstudie Belgien. Spath. Christopher. 7 July 2023. 52.
  2. Book: Almeida, Dimitri. The Impact of European Integration on Political Parties: Beyond the Permissive Consensus. 18 February 2013. 2012. CRC Press. 978-0-415-69374-5. 107.
  3. Book: Beke, Wouter. Wouter Beke. Living Apart Together: Christian Democracy in Belgium. Christian Democratic Parties in Europe since the End of the Cold War. Leuven University Press. https://books.google.com/books?id=QJ6x8zmRAaEC&pg=PA143. 2004. 143–145. 90-5867-377-4.