Dispute over financing of new national stadium

Brussels football club RSC Anderlecht intends to move from its home in the Constant Vanden Stock stadium to the new national stadium near Heysel in the summer of 2019, it has announced. Anderlecht will rent the stadium for 20 years and will receive the €4 million a year subsidy that Brussels-City currently pays to the existing King Baudouin stadium. 

The announcement of the subsidy led to immediate criticism from environmental parties Groen-Ecolo in the city council’s opposition, which reminded the council that, when the new stadium was proposed, it was promised that it would be financed entirely by private money and would not incur any public spending. 

“€330 million is a lot of money for a stadium that was supposed to cost the taxpayer nothing,” said Groen’s Arnaud Verstraete. The city’s promise of €4 million a year over 20 years comes to €80 million, to which may be added, according to experts, an estimated €250 million for mobility and infrastructure works for the new stadium.

Brussels mayor Freddy Thielemans argued that the money was currently being spent on the King Baudouin stadium. “This way a troublesome expense is being turned into an investment in the future,” he said. The stadium was not only a private matter, he said, but also a social-cultural project for Brussels and the people of Brussels.

Groen-Ecolo also argued that Anderlecht will receive a boost in income from moving to the new stadium, which has a capacity of nearly 45,000 spectators, compared to the 21,500 at their current home. The amount of rent Anderlecht will pay for the use of the new stadium has not yet been revealed. Whether the stadium will also become the new home of the Red Devils has also not yet been decided.

Photo: Ghelamco/BAM