Brussels, 30/05/2014 (Agence Europe) Michel Barnier, who made an unsuccessful bid in Dublin on 7 March to become the EPP's candidate for the presidency of the European Commission may be back in the running as support for Jean-Claude Juncker, the official head of the EPP's list, begins to weaken, according to reports in French newspaper Le Monde on Thursday 29 May, saying that the idea is being taken seriously in French circles. The news came as a bombshell in the circles of both Jean-Claude Juncker and the far left, whose candidate to become the next head of the European Commission, Alexis Tsipras of Greece, criticised the move and backed Juncker.
The news that the name of current Internal Market Commissioner Michel Barnier (of France) would be put forward again came after the special summit in Brussels on 27 May that did not back Juncker, and is being seen in the British media as proof that David Cameron's strategy is working - the British prime minister made no bones about the fact that he attended the summit in Brussels on Tuesday evening to torpedo Juncker. The Financial Times has gone as far as to openly campaign against Juncker.
The heads of state do not appear to have made any such decision on Tuesday evening. They simply decided to instruct Herman Van Rompuy to begin talks with the EP, which is already busy horse-trading internally itself, to identity the European Commission's future work programme. Several member states opposed Juncker at the meeting - the United Kingdom, Hungary and Sweden openly, and some media sources suggest they were joined by the Baltic States and Denmark, whose prime minister, Helle Thorning Schmidt, may also be interested in the job of president of the European Commission, despite her public denials.
The possibility that José Manuel Barroso may be replaced by someone from the EPP who is not one of the heads of list selected by the major political parties has made Alexis Tsipras furious. He says that, under the treaty on the European Union, the European Parliament has the right to approve or reject the candidate put forward by the European Council to become the president of the European Commission and, during the election campaign, the citizens of Europe were asked to choose between five candidates, each of whom was chosen by the big European parties. He said that the candidates had campaigned and debated in an attempt to win European citizens' votes.
Tsipras said the European Council must not present a candidate to become the president of the European Commission who did not stand in the European elections and the EP should not endorse a candidate who did not stand in the elections because any other candidate would simply discredit the whole of the European elections, turning them into a charade.
This sudden storm made the German chancellor, Angela Merkel, repeat her support for her candidate, Jean-Claude Juncker. Her spokesman Steffen Seibert tweeted that she said in a speech in Regensburg that she was carrying on all the talks in the view that Jean-Claude Juncker must become the next president of the European Commission. (SP)