Bruges : Lappersfront fights for Natural Heritage

The Lappersfort forest is a unique area. The 30 hectares of ground have been
abandoned and neglected for such a long time that it had the chance to
restore itself to its natural state, an example of what the whole of the
northwest of Europe must have been like some 3000 years ago. It has become
one of the last pieces of natural forest and marshland left in this part of
the world. What makes it unique is the fact that on that small terrain there
are 7 different ecosystems.

One would expect a city that holds such richness within its limits to do its
utmost to protect it. Not so Bruges. After a developer (the Fabricom group,
part of the multinational company Tractebel) bought the land, it chose to
let the terrain be developed for industrial purposes.

The mayor of the City, Patrick Moenaert, happens to be a member of the board
of directors of Fluxys, another Tractebel company. Fabricom also provided
the software for the last municipal elections.

In august 2001 a group of young people decided they were not going to let
this happen and occupied the forest. The occupation was brutally ended on
October 14th of this year.

During the fourteen and a half months of the occupation, the youngsters who
organised themselves in the Lappersfront, managed to get the support of 79
local and national organisations, NGOs and public figures who organised
themselves in the "Groene Gordel Front" (green belt front). This group, in
its turn, started a campaign for the safeguard of the Lappersfort forest and
the Chartreuse area, another unique piece of nature in the green belt around
the city, also threatened with disappearance through development.

For about a year neither the city council, nor the owners of the forest
seemed to take much interest in what was happening and the minister of the
Environment, Mrs. Vera Dua of the ecologist party seemed to take the side of
the activists.

Last July things started to change. The activists planned a series of events
to celebrate the one year anniversary of the occupation, they planned an
action camp (august 5-11) and the weekend before that they invited all the
inhabitants of the city to take part in a cultural event, that was a counter activity against Bruges being theCultural Capital of Europe in 2002.

When the owners heard about those events, they wrote a letter to the
occupants, telling them to evacuate the forest by August the 2nd, if not,
they would take the matter to court. The excuse for this demand was the
responsibility of the owner in case anything would happen to the visitors,
they said that allowing the public into the forest was irresponsible and
would put people as well as the forest at risk.

The Lappersfront refused to evacuate and let the August activities continue
as planned. During the action week there were several small incidents during
which people were detained by the police for several hours, one German
activist was given a deportation order saying he had the status of illegal
alien and had to leave the country within 5 days. They closed in the
activists on their way back to the forest after a demo and took pictures of
every participant.

At the end of August, the Fabricom group filed charges against the
inhabitants of the forest and they had to appear before the Justice of the
Peace on September the 4th. On the 9th the judge ruled in favour of the
Fabricom Group. On Friday, September 13th, the occupants were officially
notified with the eviction order, 72 hours later the 5 day period in which
they had to evacuate the premises started. The next day the activists stared
up a round-the-clock surveillance of the entrance to the forest and the
marshland.

For a few weeks nothing much seemed to happen. Mrs. Dua, the minister,
started negotiating with Fabricom to buy the forest but the talks were not
going very smoothly. On Monday the 7th of October some policemen and
construction workers entered the forest. They took pictures and filmed the
forest, in order to plan a strategy for the evacuation and calculate the
costs.

Exactly one week later the forest was evacuated in the most brutal way, with
no respect what so ever for people or nature. Several occupants where hurt
during the evacuation because of the brutal treatment they were given by the
police. It was almost a miracle that nobody got badly injured, people were
picked out of the trees without the slightest regard for their safety.
Sympathisers who came out in the streets to show their support to the
Lappersfront and to protest against the evacuation were beaten up and taken
into custody. A cameraman filming another cameraman who was being physically
prevented from filming the brutal molestation of a peaceful protester got
beaten up, arrested and is now charged with obstruction of police work.
The city of Bruges was besieged for the whole day. Activists were arrested
the minute they left the railway station, most of them complained the
plastic strips used as handcuffs were strapped on too tightly. After the
arrest the brutality continued, people were forced to have their pictures
and fingerprints taken, which is illegal unless they are charged with a
crime, that wasn't the case with these activists. By the end of the
afternoon protesters were taken to the football stadium, where they were
detained in the police cells. On October 14th 2002, Bruges looked a lot like
Santiago de Chile on September 11th 1973.

For the rest of the week there were actions and demos every day. On
Wednesday October 16th, 500 people marched through and around the City,
denouncing the evacuation, demanding the safeguard of the forest and
protesting against the police brutality. The same day minister Dua resumed
her negotiations with Fabricom and made an offer to buy the forest. Fabricom
asked for a week to consider the offer.

On Sunday October 20th, the former occupants and a group of sympathisers went to the forest for the weekly guided nature walk as they had done every Sunday since the beginning of the occupation. They almost broke into tears when they saw how much damage had been done to the forest during the evacuation.

The same day, in the afternoon, over 4000 people showed up for a demo in support of the Lappersfront and for the safeguard of the forest. The biggest demo the city had seen in almost twenty years, if not the biggest ever.

On Friday October 25th, Fabricom announced their refusal to sell the forest.
They plan to develop part of the area for industry, wanting to sell only the marshland, which is too expensive to develop and to open the park area to the public on the condition the government pays for its maintenance.

The Lappersfront and the Groene Gordel Front don't plan on giving up the fight until the whole of the Lapperfort forest is safe. They demand that the City Council redefine the allocated purpose of the land and they want the Flemish government to claim the forest for public interest and to expropriate Fabricom.

Public support is on the rise and the Lappersfront and the Groene Gordel front will keep fighting.

arch/ive/ief (2000 - 2005)