EU nominees: answers please!
October 3, 2014
EU sources said on Friday that the next commission's president-elect Jean-Claude Juncker would meet European Parliament heads next week amid signs of split votes over his proposed team of 28 commissioners.
At a parliamentary hearing late on Thursday, the French Socialist nominee for the EU's economic affairs portfolio Pierre Moscovici was told by conservative lawmakers that he must answer extra questions by Sunday.
Lawmakers of the center-right European People's Party (EPP) challenged Moscovici's ability to discipline France's Socialist government for missing EU deficit targets.
This followed demands from the Greens and center-left Socialists & Democrats (S&D) that parliament's legal committee examine the past oil business links within the family of Spanish conservative Miguel Arias Canete.
Juncker wants Canete as his energy and climate change commissioner.
Britain's Hill faces extra hearing
Britain's nominee to the post of financial services commissioner, Jonathan Hill, faces an extra hearing on his intentions. Analysts, however, said Hill might be approved, given lawmakers' reluctance to alienate an already euroskeptic Britain.
Tuesday's crisis talks - unprecedented in the EU's process of picking its commission - will also involve the European Parliament president Martin Schulz and the heads of parliament's conservative, socialist and liberal groups.
EU sources told the news agency AFP that parties who formed an ad hoc coalition to pick Juncker and Schulz after the European Parliament elections in May were now threatening to block each other's European Commission nominee.
Deadline: October 22
The inter-factional row needs to be sorted out by October 22 when the European Parliament is due to vote on Juncker's entire line-up of 28 commissioners. If delayed, Juncker's installation on November 1 could be upset.
European Commission officials were on Friday quoted by Reuters as saying they were "irritated" by what they saw as grandstanding by some parliamentarians emboldened in May when explicitly euroskeptic parties won several seats in the parliament.
"It's a political game between the parties in parliament - taking hostages and exchanging them," said one unnamed EU official.
Under scrutiny: Hungary's Navracsics
Parliament has also pressed Hungary's conservative former justice minister Tibor Navracsics to answer further questions. He is accused of previously trampling on civil rights and media pluralism in Hungary.
Juncker has nominated Navracsics as future commissioner for education, culture and youth.
The Czech nominee for EU justice commissioner Vera Jourova has been told that she must answer written questions by Sunday.
Three scenarios
Lawmakers said three scenarios were possible next week: a deal under which all nominees go through; a deal to replace one or two nominees whose credentials are doubted; or a reshuffle to switch problem nominees to lower-profile portfolios.
Juncker's own spokeswoman Mina Andreeva said on Friday that the former Luxembourg prime minister believed that "all candidates so far have demonstrated their competence and European commitment."
The commission is potentially one of Brussels' most powerful institutions. It will draft EU policy for the next five years in a bloc with roughly 507 million inhabitants.
ipj/msh (AFP, Reuters)