Visit our Facebook pageDuring the congress one of the meetings was with representatives from many countries about the theme of “Populism in politics”.
All over the world we can see that populism and the parties that are using it are getting more and more votes. Ilhan Kyuchyuk (politician from MRF and co-president of ALDE) states that in Bulgaria populism undermined the liberal progress, liberals are losing ground and have to turn this. Europe is very important for Bulgaria and a strong Europe, meaning not more but less and more efficient, must be the perspective. A difficult statement at the moment with all the populism in many European countries.
In Thailand the new elected government is also based on populism. The liberals are not part of the government. Winning the next elections is essential. The present party is hoping to win again and through this get absolute power in the future. One of the methods they are going to use to get this result, is the rise of minimum wage with 80%, no voters can withstand this. This all leads to much corruption and disruption of the market.
The conclusion is that some populism is necessary in the present time in any party. For in the end winning is essential.
In the Philippines the new president Ferdinand Marcos jr. was elected on the issue of anti-corruption, he belongs to no party, is a real outsider. He stands for the war on drugs but because of the Pandemic this war and the fight against it has been stopped, at the moment the government is not taking any action. In the years 2016-2020 there were 7800 deaths because of this war on drugs. The new president will have no debate and now still the Marcos mystique still has many followers.
As liberals we must act against populism and des-information. Populism can’t be fought, you have to fight it with populism and use it, liberalism packed in populism. But there is a vast difference between populism in West Europe and Asia. In Asia, money and economic growth is important but in Europe “simple answers to difficult questions”, are the points used by populist parties.
The Renew group stated that we all have to take care that no one is left behind, make yourself “popular” and use of images is needed. That should be part of the popular way to get results. It will be a challenge for all liberal parties.
During the final session of the Congress the results were made known of the elections for the Bureau and the committees.
Hakima el Haité was re-elected as President of Liberal International.
Our president Jayanthi Devi Balaguru and past-president Margaret de Vos van Steenwijk were elected in the Human Rights Committee.
Ruth Richardson, board member, was elected in the Climate Justice Committee
Deputy-president Khadija el Morabit was elected in the Fair Trade Committee.