By Anne-France White - 15th January 2007
The European parliament faces changes this week as MEPs vote for a new president and welcome 53 new members.
Parliament faces a mid-term reshuffle, with the president, vice-presidents and quaestors set to change this week with a series of elections on 16 January.
Elections
Former EPP-ED group leader Hans-Gert Poettering is widely expected to succeed Josep Borrell as parliament president following a controversial power-sharing deal agreed in 2004 by the EPP-ED and the PES – parliament’s two largest groups.
The backroom deal has caused discontent among the other groups, and three other MEPs are now running against Poettering in the “fair chair” campaign in order to protest the power-sharing arrangement.
The other candidates are Ind/Dem co-leader, Jens-Peter Bonde, Green group leader Monica Frassoni and GUE/NGL group leader Francis Wurtz.
All four MEPs will meet on 15 January for what should be a fiery debate touching on issues such as the one-seat campaign calling for parliament to stop travelling to Strasbourg.
Of the three candidates running against Poettering, Frassoni is tipped to win the most votes.
While the post of president is seen largely as ceremonial outside the parliament, it does carry a significant amount of influence within the EU institutions.
MEPs will also vote for 14 vice-presidents and six parliamentary quaestors on 16 January, and this week’s plenary will also see MEPs decide who will sit on the various committees.
As for the committee chairs, they are to be decided next week with a reshuffle among parliament’s political groups.
Outgoing president Josep Borrell is expected to become chair of one of the committees – development and trade have both been mentioned as possibilities.
Meanwhile French MEP Joseph Daul has been elected to succeed Poettering at the head of the EPP-ED group.
But his new mandate has already been overshadowed by reports, leaked to the media by the eurosceptic UKIP group, that Daul has been under investigation in France since 2004 as part of a broader judicial inquiry into the alleged misuse of agricultural funds.
New MEPs
In a landmark for parliament, the 53 new Romanian and Bulgarian MEPs will take part in the plenary session for the first time.
The 35 Romanians and 18 Bulgarians, who have been appointed by their national parliaments, will keep their seats until European elections in the two countries later this year.
In an unexpected twist, the arrival of the new MEPs has enabled the creation of a new extreme-right group at parliament, which will call itself “Identity, Tradition and Sovereignty”.
The group has fulfilled the criteria of having 20 deputies from six countries, courtesy of five members of the nationalist Greater Romania party and a deputy from Bulgaria’s anti-Roma Ataka party.
Interestingly, most of the parties forming the new group had opposed EU membership for Romania and Bulgaria in the first place.
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