Archive: Mayor to stand for election

Elections for municipal councils throughout Belgium due to take place in October will have at least one star candidate. Walter De Donder, who will stand on a Christian Democrat list in Flemish Brabant province, is a double-barrelled star of children's television, beloved to children across the Dutch-speaking world as Kabouter Plop, a forest gnome, and as De Burgemeester in Samson & Gert, where he plays the mayor of a small town -- a post to which he was never elected, as the character is fictional.

Kabouter Plop, artist's impression


Burgemeester De Donder pictured yesterday