It comes as no surprise but it is now official: Vice-President Maros Sefcovic is making a bid for the presidency of the European Commission for the European Socialist Party (ESP) within the Socialist and Democrat alliance (S&D). He announced this at a press conference in Brussels on Monday 17 September. Internal elections will be held on 1 December should there be more than one candidate.
Sefcovic presents himself as a candidate with experience and close to citizens. He has served as European commissioner since 2009 and is currently responsible for energy matters. Over the past ten years, he said, he has been able to meet “hundreds of citizens in all member states” and these meetings have taught him the importance of hard work, determination, idealism and hope. “Another lesson that I have learnt is that it is necessary to reignite the driving force for integration. (...) We must rid ourselves of the barbed wire mentality”, he said.
Sefcovic is the first member of the S&D Group to enter the race for the “Spitzenkandidat” (or head of list). Other names are doing the rounds such as Pierre Moscovici of France and Frans Timmermans of the Netherlands, both European commissioners. Some also have in mind the former Danish prime minister, Helle Thorning-Schmidt. In the other political families, Manfred Weber, a member of the EPP Group, has already put his candidacy forward (see EUROPE 12089), and four ecologists did the same on Monday for the EGP.
The Spitzenkandidat system, set in place at the request of the European Parliament and in effect since 2014, provides for pan-European parties to run in elections with head-of-list candidates, and for the person coming first to automatically become the next president of the European Commission.
ESP procedure
European Socialist Party candidatures are open until Thursday 18 October. To be valid, they must be supported by nine parties (including that of the candidate) and five organisations belonging to the ESP. In Strasbourg on 12 September, the S&D Group decided to hear all the candidates and to vote on their candidacies on 1 December. Nomination of the candidate coming head of the list for the Social Democrats will be confirmed during the ESP Congress, in Lisbon on Friday 7 and Saturday 8 December. (Original version in French by Sophie Petitjean)