European industry is still behind Commissioner for the Digital Economy and Society Günther Oettinger after his racist and homophobic comments in Hamburg. That was made clear from the speech by the BusinessEurope director general and a straw poll carried out by EUROPE at a conference organised by ETNO and Proximus in Brussels on Friday 4 November.
Oettinger’s comments on Chinese people, same-sex marriage and the Wallonia region (see EUROPE 11659) have been centre stage for a number of days.
While the European press has been highly critical of the commissioner, with Politico, for example, giving a satirical interpretation of his apology, the tone was very different in the business world.
At a conference organised by ETNO, the association of incumbent telecoms operators, and mobile telephony operator Proximus, the head of the private employers federation, Markus J. Beyrer, highlighted Oettinger’s experience and his coordinating role in facilitating the digital transition. Of the 15 people questioned, at random, among the conference participants, 12 felt that Oettinger, who chaired the federal media policy committee of the CDU between 2000 and 2006, should not be forced to resign, as some have called for (including the leader of the CdH, the Centrist French-speaking party in Belgium, Benoit Lutgen).
Quite the contrary, bosses are rather apprehensive at the prospect of the departure of the commissioner, renowned for his knowledge of the telecoms market and for calming the ardour of Commission Vice-President Andrus Ansip on cross-border access to digital content (the end of geo-blocking). At the end of October, Oettinger was named by the president of the European Commission as the replacement for the Bulgarian commissioner with responsibility for the budget, Kristalina Georgieva, on her departure to join the World Bank.
At the Commission, humour is used to deal with the issue. “Thank you to everyone for allowing me a short break and not asking me about the consequences of Brexit”, smiled Gail Kent of DG Connect at the ETNO-Proximus conference. (Original version in French by Sophie Petitjean)