Petra De Sutter and Herwig Reynaert elected rector and vice-rector
Petra De Sutter & Herwig Reynaert © Alexander Meeus
(30-04-2025) On Wednesday 30 April 2025, the Rector and Vice-Rector elections at Ghent University were won by Petra De Sutter and Herwig Reynaert.
The first voting round of the Rector and Vice-Rector elections at Ghent University ended at 12:00 on Wednesday 30 April 2025.
The candidate duo Petra De Sutter and Herwig Reynaert obtained a majority in all electoral groups. This means that they will be nominated for appointment as Rector and Vice-Rector to the board of governors meeting at 17:00 today.
In these Rector and Vice-Rector elections, two candidate duos emerged: Petra De Sutter and Herwig Reynaert, and Rik Van de Walle and Ilse Derluyn.
Four electoral groups at Ghent University were entitled to vote: ZAP (professors), AAP (assistants and PhD students), ATP (administrative and technical staff) and students. To be eligible to vote, you had to be at least 50% appointed or contracted (or registered as student).
Voting was completely electronic and anonymous via a secured voting platform.
Election results in numbers
In absolute numbers
| ZAP | AAP | ATP | Students | In total | |
| Petra De Sutter - Herwig Reynaert | 645 | 2.314 | 1.726 | 7.369 | 12.054 |
| Rik Van de Walle - Ilse Derluyn | 463 | 641 | 338 | 2.648 | 4.090 |
| Abstentions | 52 | 112 | 55 | 171 | 390 |
| Total votes | 1.160 | 3.067 | 2.119 | 10.188 | 16.534 |
In percentages
| ZAP | AAP | ATP | Students | Average vote percentage | |
| Petra De Sutter - Herwig Reynaert | 55,60% | 75,45% | 81,45% | 72,33% | 71,21% |
| Rik Van de Walle - Ilse Derluyn | 39,91% | 20,90% | 15,95% | 25,99% | 25,69% |
| Abstentions | 4,48% | 3,65% | 2,60% | 1,68% | 3,10% |
Turnout
| ZAP | AAP | ATP | Students | In total | |
| Total number of eligible voters | 1.451 | 7.726 | 3.040 | 41.318 | 53.535 |
| Turnout in % | 79,94% | 39,70% | 69,70% | 24,66% | 30,88% |
New rectoral team
Petra De Sutter and Herwig Reynaert start their mandate as the new rectorial team on 1 October 2025:
Petra De Sutter is a gynaecologist specialising in reproductive medicine. In 1991, she obtained a PhD in biomedical sciences from the Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences. She later became full Professor at the Department of Urogynaecology (now Human Structure and Recovery). From 2008 to 2019, she was head of the fertility clinic. In 2014, she became a (half-time) Senator and member of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe. In 2019, she became a full-time MEP and Deputy Prime Minister in the federal government from 2020 to 2025.
Herwig Reynaert is a full Professor and chairman of the Centre for Local Politics in the Department of Political Science at the Faculty of Political and Social Sciences. He teaches courses on local and Belgian politics and is promoter of the chair ‘The Future of Sports’. Since 2009, he has been Dean of the Faculty of Political and Social Sciences. Before that, he was, among other things, Faculty ombudsperson (1998-2004), chairman of the political science education committee (2002-2006), Academic Secretary (2004-2008), Education Director (2006-2009) and member of the board of governors (2011-2012).