Council of State

The application shall bear the heading ‘verzoekschrift tot nietigverklaring’, or ‘requête en annulation’ or ‘Nichtigkeitsantragschrift’. It must be signed by the applicant or by his lawyer. It has to include at least the following data and statements:

• each applicant’s name and address;
• an expressly elected address for service, i.e. an address in Belgium that will be used for all correspondence concerning the appeal;
• the decision the annulment of which is claimed;
• the opposing party, i.e. the authority that has taken this decision;
• a statement of the factual circumstances of the case;
• a statement of the ‘grounds’, indicating which legal provisions have been infringed and how they were broken.

A copy of the contested decision has to be enclosed. If the applicant is a legal person, a copy of the published articles of association and a copy of the coordinated articles of association must be enclosed. If a legal person’s application is not lodged by a lawyer, the decision of the legal person’s body which is competent to lodge the appeal also has to be submitted, along with a copy of that body’s designation. The documents that have to be enclosed and all the other documents which may be submitted in support of the appeal must be numbered and mentioned in a bordereau.

The application has to be sent to the Registry of the Council of State, rue de la Science 33, 1040 Brussels, either by registered mail, or by using the electronic procedure (for more details, see the ‘e-Procedure’ tab on this website). If the application is sent by registered mail, the original application always has to be accompanied by three certified copies and a supplementary copy for each opposing party. The actions for annulment must be lodged within a rather short period of sixty days after publication, notification, or noticing of the decision.

If some of the compulsory mentions, documents or copies are lacking, the examination of the case will undoubtedly be delayed. Moreover, the appeal may have to be declared inadmissible and may not be treated.

Each applicant must pay a fee of 200 euros within a term of  30 days. Upon receipt of the application the Registry provides a bank transfer form to that end.

ATTENTION: The documents relating to the case have to be couched in Dutch, French or German according to the rules laid down in Title VI, Chapter II, of the coordinated laws on the Council of State (articles 64 to 66).