Joëlle Milquet

Belgian federal Minister of the Interior

Joëlle Milquet (born 17 February 1961) is a Belgian politician. She was initiator and the first chair of the French-speaking Centre démocrate humaniste (cdH), the new name of the Parti social-chrétien (PSC) since 2002.

She was deputy prime minister from 2008 to 2014 and held various ministerial positions. She was also a senator and an MP, a politician of the French Community and the Brussels-Capital Region, a councillor of both Woluwe-Saint-Pierre and Brussels and also an alderwoman of last one. She was nicknamed "Madame Non" because of her fierce opposition to a state reform desired by the Dutch-speaking parties during the cabinet formation in 2007.

Milquet was born in Charleroi and studied law at the Catholic University of Louvain and the University of Amsterdam. She worked as a lawyer before entering into politics.

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