Much ado about nothing
Euranet, 29.09.2014
Interview
The hearings of the 27 EU commissioners-designate by the members of the European Parliament, taking place from September 29 until October 7, may finally sound as the famous Shakespeare play: “Much ado about nothing” – basically a lot of noise for a small issue. During our monthly programme in collaboration with the Brussels-based European Policy Centre (EPC), Janis Emmanouilidis, Director of studies at EPC, felt that in the end the European Parliament will accept the new European Commission.
Each commissioner-designate will be grilled for three hours, responding to more than 40 questions.
Miguel Arias Cañete, the Spanish nominee set to deal with climate action and energy policy, is expected to face the toughest hearing. But also the Hungarian commissioner, Tibor Navracsics, in charge of culture and education, or even Jonhatan Hill, the British commissioner-designate for financial affairs, may face some uncomfortable questions.
So who does Emmanouilidis think is going to be rejected? His answer was simple and clear – nobody will be pushed out.
“A strong political actor”
Emmanouilids stressed that this new EU Commission would be “a strong political actor”.
The expert explained that by nominating a Greek man, Dimitris Avramopoulos, to be in charge of immigration policy, and a French one, Pierre Moscovici, to be in charge of economic affairs, Jean Claude Juncker, the European Commission’s president, was sending a strong political signal, saying to these men: “We trust you and we want you to play a key part in the EU” and so gave them a strong portfolio.
The European Parliament will make a final vote in order to approve or reject the whole Commission’s on October 22. The new European executive team is supposed to start working on November 1.
Listen to the whole interview here
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