The fate of the six executive vice-presidents of the EC – Ursula von der Leyen's most important deputies – and with them the entire new one The commission had been hanging in the balance for over a week. Estonian Kaja Kallas, Italian Raffaele Fitto, Romanian Roxana Mînzatu, French Stéphane Séjourné, Spanish Teresa Ribera and Finnish Henna Virkkunen have become hostages of the political game. Allied parties in their final stages clashed in the fight for who will have more power in the next five years.
Commissioners hostage to a political bargain
Although all the commissioners' hearings were assessed rather positively, the waiting time for their approval by the European Parliament took over a week, and approval required the involvement of the European Parliament President, Roberta Metsola, and the mediation of Ursula von der Leyen herself.
Finally, on the afternoon of November 20, the European People's Party (EPP), the Socialists and Democrats (S&D) and the Renew liberals reached an agreement and, unusually in the EU, the agreement was concluded – as Euronews reports – in writing. This kind of “coalition agreement” in nine points it lists the most important values, tasks and goals of the new Commission, which the three parties pledge to support.
These include, among others: rule of law, support for Ukraine and pro-Europeanism, security, including the development of the defense sector, increased EU competitiveness, but without destroying the Green Deal, effective migration policy and border protection, flexible budget and the search for new EU financial resources, as well as the necessary EU reforms – even with treaty changes, if they prove necessary.
However, the document signed by Weber, Iratxe Garcia from S&D and Valerie Hayer from Renew does not exclude – as liberals and socialists wanted – cooperation, e.g. with the European Conservatives and Reformists (ECR) faction. So in practice, the EPL got what it wanted.
Von der Leyen wants to have a wide choice
It was, among other things, the tactical alliances of the EPP with the ECR during some votes in the EP that added fuel to the fire that was already smoldering between the largest EU party led by Manfred Weber and the others.
When the socialists had no intention of voting for the solutions supported by the EPP, they were simply outvoted several times by the right-wing alliance. In addition, in the new Commission, the position of executive vice-president was to be – and will be – the aforementioned Raffaele Fitto, i.e. Giorgia Meloni's man. Although he is considered a moderate, some MPs from the Socialists, Liberals and Greens did not want to hear about cooperation with the far-right Italian.
Whereas Ursula von der Leyen – which in July also won the support of the Greens, i.e. the left flank of the EP, for its second term – she was very careful not to block the parallel bridge to the right, to Rome. Decisions may come in which the support of the ECR will simply be needed for effective governance. Hence the important chair for Fitto.
EPL got what it wanted
When S&D threatened to block Fitto and Orbán's Commission nominee Olivér Várhelyi, the EPP questioned the nomination of Teresa Ribera as Commissioner for Clean Transition and Competitiveness. She is the only member of the new Commission from the S&D faction who was given a really important and large area, and she will be von der Leyen's actual deputy. Manfred Weber was helped by Ribera's problems in his native Spain, where the politician of the ruling left was accused of co-responsibility for the tragic consequences of the flood that had recently hit the country.
In the end, the socialists achieved little. Ribera stays, Fitto stays, everyone else stays too. As a result of a week of political haggling, this is the first time since 1999 that none of the commissioner candidates was questioned by the parliament. It is also a show of strength of the EPP, which with 14 commissioners dominated the future EU executive.
Brussels This time, time was very important. Failure to reach an agreement this week would make it impossible to vote on the entire Commission at next week's European Parliament session. This, in turn, would mean that the Commission would not start its work on December 1. In the face of Donald Trump's victory in the USA and the ongoing war Russia with Ukraine, a prolonged transition period, i.e. weakening the EU's executive power, would put the EU in a very weak position in the international game.
The article comes from the website Deutsche Welle