Societe Generale de Banque

Societe Generale de Banque (Society General) was the largest financial firm in Belgium, controlled by a fraternity of families who provided most of the funding for Parti Social Chretien (Christian Social Party, CSP) political campaigns. A bulk of Belgian industrial firms were controlled by the holding company. A group of prominent figures involved with the CSP and this financial firm were identified in the X-Dossier as powerful figures in a network of child abusers linked to Jean-Michel Nihoul. The bank's interconnected web of political and financial power placed it at the center of the Belgian establishment implicated in the X-Dossier allegations.¹

Figures Named in the X-Dossier

X1, and later other x-witnesses, named or identified two former Belgian Prime Ministers affiliated with the CSP: Paul Vanden Boeynants and Wilfried Martens. A director of Societe Generale named Baron Benoit de Bonvoisin was identified. A chairman of Societe Generale named Count Leopold Lippens, and his brother Count Francois Lippens, were named. A magistrate named Melchior Wathelet, who served on the European Court of Justice, was identified. A powerful Brussels attorney named Jean-Paul Dumont was also named. X1 said she had been gang-raped by a group of men among whom she identified Jean-Michel Nihoul, the lawyer Michel Vander Elst, and Count Leopold Lippens. The latter was a longtime Mayor of Knokke-Heist from a prominent family with a controlling interest in Societe Generale de Belgique.¹