After 1999
After the elections, Guy Verhofstadt formed the first Belgian government without the Christian Democrats since 1958. Dehaene remained senator until 2001, when he became mayor of Vilvoorde, a city near Brussels. He also joined the Board of Directors of Lernout & Hauspie where he was part of what is considered one of the largest corporate scandals in history prior to Enron. To the surprise of many, he was nominated by Verhofstadt to become Vice Chairman of the Convention on the Future of Europe. In order to offer support to his party, the CD&V (Christian Democrat and Flemish), he was once again a candidate during the 2003 elections, but this was clearly not with the intention of becoming Prime Minister, as he was put as last person on the party list. In June 2004, Jean-Luc Dehaene was elected to the European Parliament. In 2003, he was awarded the Vlerick Award.
After the Belgian elections of 2007, Dehaene was appointed as mediator in the process to form a new government.
Dehaene is currently serving as the chief enforcer of UEFA's Financial Fair Play.
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