I had never been to Zelzate before

And this is the biography of a factory village like no other in Flanders. A rough sketch of an industrial island sawn in two by the Ghent-Terneuzen canal. The labyrinthine story of socialist mayors who are from the union, of occupations and factory strikes, of gypsum mountains and sludge dumps, and of mémékes who refuse to pay municipal taxes. A story that spans almost a century.
The central theme is the arrival of the Sidérurgie Maritime in the sixties, which makes the whole of Zelzate dance the polonaise. Sidmar finally propels the factory village into the mainstream. Pistier Omer De Bruyder, who folds a handlebar in half for a pint of Trappist beer; mister Laureys of the RVA, who helps half of Zelzate find a job at Sidmar and is active at the ACW. Tina Turner who performs with her Ike in the hall The Mercury; the young doctors Roland Van Acker and Frans Van Acoleyen who open a group practice on the Groenplein; Rode Valk Freddy De Vilder who becomes the coming man of the SP; and an author who had never been to Zelzate and does not understand how the Partij Van de Arbeid has six municipal councillors there: a handful of people, a municipality, almost a century.