This week, the Mouvement Réformateur stops in Erezée, a municipality in the Province of Luxembourg on the edge of the Ardennes and the Famenne, bringing together 27 villages and hamlets. Elected to the municipal council since 1988 and mayor since 2006, Michel JACQUET continues his work with a strengthened majority (8 out of 13 elected members) following the 2024 elections. Erezée boasts particularly rich heritage: a former local railway line (now the Aisne Tourist Tramway), fortified farmhouses, mills, religious buildings, memorials from both world wars, the Fisenne ice house converted into a bat shelter, and the protected Hazeilles coppice woodland. It is a municipality steeped in history, rural in character and geared towards low-key tourism.
Michel, you were re-elected mayor of Érezée with a record personal score, after decades of service to your municipality. How do you view this renewed trust and, with your experience, what still drives your daily commitment to the residents and the many villages of Érezée?
It was with humility but also great pride that I welcomed the support of one in two voters after 20 years of uninterrupted governance. I know the residents trust me, and I must live up to that trust. It is my love for my municipality and its residents that guides my concerns as mayor and brings me great satisfaction, despite the major difficulties that all Walloon municipalities are experiencing and will continue to experience.
The redevelopment of the heart of Mormont is now under way, while the municipality is preparing the project for a new municipal building housing its services and the CPAS. How can these projects concretely improve access to public services and create new living spaces, without losing the rural, village character that residents hold dear?
We are deeply attached to our rural character, but also to giving our citizens the maximum range of services. I often say that we live in a small municipality that has everything a large one has. So we have been able to develop a sports hall, sports grounds, a nursery, a fire station, public housing, and so on. Today, however, we mainly need to focus on renovating our 250 kilometres of roads. The project for a new municipal building bringing together the municipality's services and the CPAS is close to our hearts, but it cannot go ahead without substantial subsidies from the Walloon Region.
Mobility and the state of the roads remain major challenges in a municipality as spread out as Érezée. The temporary closure of the N807 between Hotton and Soy, as well as the upcoming works on rue Magerat and rue Pré Ligné in Biron, illustrate the scale of the work to be carried out. How does the municipality organise these interventions with the SPW, and what are your priorities for making journeys between villages safer in the long term, while keeping disruption for residents to a minimum?
With our 250 kilometres of roads, to which we must add agricultural tracks and routes for vulnerable road users (cyclists, horses, etc.), it is clear that this is a major challenge for our municipality. Each year we set aside substantial budgets to renovate or improve our roads, as well as to enhance user safety. We are also crossed by numerous regional roads that are likewise being renovated. Of course, we would like to see more investment from the Region in its roads, but overall, disruption for users remains limited thanks to the coordination we maintain with each local road department.
