17 Facts About Filip Dewinter

Philip Michel Frans "Filip" Dewinter was born on 11 September 1962 and is a Belgian politician, journalist and commentator.

Filip Dewinter is one of the leading members of Vlaams Belang, a right-wing Flemish nationalist and secessionist political party.

Filip Dewinter's father was studying medicine at the Leuven University during World War II, when he had to hide, as the threat of being deported by the Germans increased.

Filip Dewinter was nevertheless arrested and already after a few months of imprisonment in Bruges, had been deported to Germany to work in a munitions factory.

Filip Dewinter returned, after the war, sick and emaciated and unable to take up his studies again.

Filip Dewinter was already politically active during his high school years at the Sint-Franciscus-Xaverius instituut in Bruges.

Filip Dewinter completed a journalist degree at the Erasmus College in 1985.

Filip Dewinter was, together with Gerolf Annemans, the author of the notorious '70-puntenplan' published in the beginning of the 1990s, a policy paper consisting of 70 articles.

Together with Hugo Coveliers of the VLOTT party, Filip Dewinter formed a list cartel for the city elections of Antwerp on 8 October 2006.

An extreme right-wing activist is sentenced to five years in prison in 2014 for planning the murder of Filip Dewinter, hoping to drag Belgium into civil war.

In October 2022, Filip Dewinter was physically assaulted by a left-wing activist while giving a talk at a community centre in Kessel-Lo.

On March 25,2024, an investigation by Humo magazine and the Apache website revealed that Filip Dewinter had worked for several years as a "senior political advisor" for China.

One month later it was revealed that Filip Dewinter was involved in the then uncovered Russian Influential Network "Voice of Europe".

Filip Dewinter was the guest speaker for a gathering of the former SS-collaborators of Sint-Maartensfonds which took place on 1 December 2001.

That evening, Filip Dewinter opened his speech with the words "My Honour is loyalty" which was the official motto of the German SS-soldiers during WWII.

Filip Dewinter is one of the historic leaders of the party.

In 2007 Filip Dewinter took part in hosting the international counter-jihad conference in Brussels in the European and Flemish Parliaments.