Wouter Van Bellingen has a good Flemish name. He is a former patrol leader in the Boy Scouts. He is an elected official of a party that wants more autonomy for Flanders. And he is a Belgian black.
Now, three couples in the town of Sint Niklaas - whose patron saint is Santa Claus - have judged their registrar by his skin and cancelled their weddings. 'I am not really surprised. I'm used to having more space on the train than my fellow passengers,' said van Bellingen, a 34-year-old father of two. However, the town's Socialist mayor, former minister Freddy Willockx, said that he was shocked by the racism that was being shown by the people of Flanders. 'I had found the image of a black man officiating at a white wedding rather beautiful,' he mused.
But while the Prime Minister, Guy Verhofstadt, has expressed his indignation at the situation, the country's racial equality commission has been caught on the hop. 'We are more used to cases where someone seeking services has been discriminated against. Legally there is not much we can do,' said Jozef de Witte, the director of the Centre pour l'Egalité des Chances. Van Bellingen knows just what the racist couples can do: 'They have three choices - to accept me as their registrar, to stay single, or to move. I have been elected for six years.'
The registrar began his job at the town hall of St Niklaas, to the west of Antwerp, on 1 January - two months after topping the list in local elections of Spirit, a left-inclined nationalist party whose coalition with the Socialist Party scored 35 per cent of the vote. Vlaams Belang, the right-wing nationalists who want Flanders to break away from Belgium, won 26 per cent of the vote in the town, which has a population of 70,000.
'I was in all the papers because I had become the first black alderman in Belgium,' said Van Bellingen, who was born in Antwerp to Rwandan parents and grew up in St Niklaas with an adoptive white family. His three brothers and sisters were half-Indian, half-African and white.
Mayor Willockx, 60, said that he had only learnt of the cancellations from town hall staff after the event. 'In Belgium, couples wishing to be married can pencil in a date at their town hall up to six months before the ceremony,' he said. 'The place of marriage is determined by the bride's home address. It seems that the three couples had been pencilled in. The cancellations happened independently of one another but in each case the couples or their parents were clear about their reason; they didn't want a black man officiating.
'The director of administration came to me in confidence to find out how he should handle future cancellations, especially since one set of parents had been abusive. If it happens again, I want to talk to the people, but there is nothing that we can do to trace those who have already cancelled their pencilling-in.'
He has received more than 2,000 emails and letters since the cancellations became public knowledge three weeks ago. 'Only about 10 have been racist or critical of the council's support for the registrar,' the mayor said. 'This is not a racist town. We have a refugee centre right in the middle of town and we have never had any problems.'
Van Bellingen, who has married 25 couples since the beginning of the year, views the whole experience as enriching. 'The African in me - who always likes to see the positive side of life - feels happy about what has happened,' he said. 'I hope that the three couples change their minds. If they do, I shall happily marry them and thank them for bringing about a debate. The issue of race is too often hushed up because people feel ill at ease with it. My books are now full until August and the people I marry all want me in their wedding photograph. The people of St Niklaas are so proud of their black registrar.'
As a result of the marriage controversy, local members of Belgian human rights groups have organised a symbolic mass wedding on the market square of St Niklaas to take place on 21 March, which is World Anti-Racism Day.
'It's going to be such fun,' said Van Bellingen. 'We have 200 couples so far and we're going to have the most crowded wedding photo ever, the biggest wedding dance ever and the most multicultural buffet imaginable.'
Grand Place in Sint-Niklaas, which is the one with the largest surface area in Belgium.

In Sint-Niklaas, Belgium, a multicultural mass marriage event is to take place next Wednesday, on the U.N.-designated International Day for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination. More than 550 couples have already registered to make a devotion pledge or renew their wedding vows before municipal officer Wouter Van Bellingen. The alderman called for the event after three couples cancelled their marriage because Wouter is black.

Van Bellingen, whose Rwandan parents gave him up for adoption, grew up in Sint-Niklaas as the youngest child in a family of 4 adopted children. Van Bellingen is a member of the political party Spirit, which strives for more Flemish autonomy in Belgium. After the 2006 municipal elections in Belgium, he became the first black councillor in Belgium, responsible for civilian, youth and international affairs in Sint-Niklaas. "The combination of his black skin colour with the shiny white brides dresses will be very photogenic..." mayor Freddy Willockx predicted when he presented his councillors. One month after Van Bellingen took office, the media reported that three couples refused to be married by a black registrar.

At first, Van Bellingen wasn't very surprised. "As a coloured person, I go through this every day. That's just the reality in Flanders. Only, I didn't expect this to happen so fast." After the incident, Van Bellingen got hundreds of calls and letter from people supporting him, including prime minister Guy Verhofstadt, who condemned "such as stupid form of racism".

Socialist mayor Willockx accused the far-right political party Vlaams Belang (Eng. ''Flemish Interest'') of creating the atmosphere for his deputy's experience. Vlaams Belang is second in the polls for the elections next June in Flanders. But, as Van Bellingen pointed out: "This is not just a problem in Sint-Niklaas, or in Flanders, but all over Europe. And there are racists in every political party here."

Since Van Bellingen made the news, the number of wedding ceremonies he has to lead has doubled, and even bookings for 2008 are coming in. Because many people regretted the fact that they could not be married by the famous alderman, he decided to organise a mass wedding, on the International anti-racism day. Not only future and established couples can take part in the ceremony, but even teens who want to prove their love. "Anyone can wed that day. I'm not a racist."

Similar to the television show Fata Morgana, Wouter has 5 challenges for the couples and for the city of Sint-Niklaas: together, they are to realise the biggest wedding pledge, a big wedding photo, a big group hug on the market square, a multicultural dessert buffet and a big first wedding dance.