  eduard marie august "ward" beysen (; 26 june 1941 â 14 january 2005) was a belgian politician and well-known freemason. he held a degree in dutch and history teaching, obtained in 1963 in lier and started his political career in the seventies in the flemish liberal party, the party for freedom and progress (pvv), which was renamed flemish liberals and democrats (vld) in 1992. ward beysen - suffering a depression - died by drowning himself in the lake of fort 6 in the south of antwerp. == political career == * 1974-1981, member of the antwerp province council. * 1981-1995, member of the belgian chamber of representatives. * 1985-1995, floor leader of the vld in the belgian parliament. * 1988, minister of the interior in the flemish regional government. * 1995-1999, member of the flemish parliament. * 1999-2004, member of the european parliament. * 1989-2000, member of the antwerp city council. == dissatisfaction == in 1992, the pvv was transformed into the moderate-liberal vld. beysen accepted this change, in spite of him always insisting on moving more to the right. beysen wanted to stop the rise of the far-right vlaams blok in antwerp by adopting a more "rightist" rhetoric. in 1991, he chose "the most important land is the innerland" (het belangrijkste land is het binnenland) as his election slogan, which was clearly based on the vlaams blok motto "the own people at first" (eigen volk eerst). in 1994, he made security his main election campaign issue, just like the vb already did for many years. because of this modus operandi - which was not at all successful in antwerp - he was called "black beysen" (zwartje beysen) in certain media. in 2000, he was punished by the party for several years of failing campaigns. leo delwaide became the liberal mayor candidate for antwerp. beysen ended in second place. in the same year, his party refused to support him candidating for a vacant seat in the board of the largest public institute of higher education in antwerp. the vld endorsed the candidate of the other party. beysen was publicly embarrassed and did not run for the seat which easily went to his opponent. == liberal appeal == ward beysen was dissatisfied with the increasingly leftist policies of the vld.
1941_births 2005_deaths Flemish_people MEPs_for_Belgium_1999a2004 Open_Vlaamse_Liberalen_en_Democraten_politicians People_from_Mortsel Politicians_who_committed_suicide Suicides_by_drowning Suicides_in_Belgium