As COP30 has just concluded in Belém, Brazil, Ecolo co-president Samuel Cogolati criticizes the absence of Prime Minister Bart De Wever. A guest on the radio program Matin Première, Cogolati believes that Belgium is “joining the ranks of fossil fuel coalitions.”
“It’s a disgrace,” the Ecolo co-president declared. “Lula (the Brazilian president, ed.) spoke of a COP of truth. We see those who are making a show of it, like President Macron, or just yesterday, the Governor of California. And then there are those who are backing out.”
“It’s a national embarrassment. Since 2018, every Belgian prime minister had attended this major global climate conference. Today, Bart De Wever is conspicuously absent,” laments Samuel Cogolati.
Belgium will nevertheless be represented by the Federal Minister for Climate, Jean-Luc Crucke (Engagés), and the Walloon Minister for Energy, Cécile Neven (MR).
But for Samuel Cogolati, this intra-Belgian agreement is insufficient.
Ecolo co-president Samuel Cogolati
“When are we going to make the survival of our population a political priority?” asks Samuel Cogolati. For Samuel Cogolati, what should mobilize every political leader is the question of the survival of humanity.
“What’s happening under the media radar is staggering: 2025 will be the hottest year ever recorded. Eight million deaths—that’s the mortality figure linked to air pollution. That’s the population of Sweden that’s decimated every year,” warns the co-president of Ecolo.
Faced with this challenge, the Ecolo co-president believes that Belgium is backsliding.
“We have ministers from the Engagés and MR parties who are nowhere to be seen and who are backtracking on the SNCB (Belgian National Railways), backtracking on insulation grants, backtracking on the tram in Liège,” laments Samuel Cogolati.
“Moving from an awareness-raising strategy to a combative one”
“We’re going to have to shift gears, but also change our strategy,” acknowledges Samuel Cogolati, co-president with Marie Lecocq since July 2024.
After launching a major restructuring project in January 2025, based on “popular ecology,” the Ecolo co-president is announcing a new strategy.
“Faced with this right wing, this MR (Reformist Movement), and the Engagés (Committed) who are choosing every man for himself, faced with the PS (Socialist Party) which is in a kind of state paternalism, we must propose an ecology of freedoms,” declares Samuel Cogolati.
Marie Lecocq and Samuel Cogolati elected to the co-presidencies of Ecolo
“Freedom to no longer depend on Vladimir Putin’s fossil fuel imports for heating, freedom to be educated in a free public school, and also freedom to climb the social ladder thanks to a real tax shift—this is the new direction we will be proposing to our Green Party members in the coming days,” explains the co-president of Ecolo.
The co-president says he believes in a positive message: “When I see Roby Etten in the Netherlands, or even Zohran Mamdani, the new mayor of New York, they win because they have a positive vision.”
“Yes, we are still a duo.” Is Samuel Cogolati’s position the same as that defended by Marie Lecocq? The Green Party co-president doesn’t hide the existence of tensions that he considers “logical.”
“Marie Lecocq and I took the reins of the party a little over a year ago, at an absolutely critical moment, after a crushing electoral defeat, an unprecedented defeat. So, at a certain point, I’m sorry, but it’s quite logical that, faced with such significant challenges, we do indeed ask ourselves serious questions about what comes next and about strategy.”
“We have a historic opportunity in Europe.”
However, in Europe, the environmental movement is also struggling. On November 13, the 27 European finance ministers could vote in favor of revising the European directive on energy taxation. The issue at stake? While the Green Deal planned to gradually reduce the tax exemption enjoyed by the aviation, maritime transport, and fishing sectors, the 27 could maintain this advantage for fossil fuels.
“Faced with fossil fuel coalitions, we need to set up climate coalitions. We will have to fight, no longer by pointing the finger at certain citizens, but actually by reaching out to many sectors, industrial, civil society, NGOs, to effectively change the game at the European level,” says Samuel Cogolati.
“We have a historic opportunity in Europe. We have absolutely no oil or gas reserves on our continent. Therefore, not only is it in the planet’s interest to safeguard the climate, but it’s also an economic interest,” emphasizes the co-president of Ecolo.
Contrary to what Samuel Cogolati claims, these oil and gas reserves are not entirely absent from the European continent. But the largest energy supplier, namely Norway, has always refused to join the European Union.
Ecolo ready to take responsibility in Brussels
Faced with the absence of a Brussels government, Ecolo says it is ready to take responsibility to break the deadlock.
“We’ve seen too many drawn-out dramas. Now we need decisions to save the Brussels economy, but also all these environmental and social organizations that are on the verge of collapse; it’s very serious,” declares the co-president of Ecolo, who believes that the negotiations led by the Socialist Party (PS), the Engagés, and the Reformist Movement (MR) are at a standstill.
