The ALDE party's Europe team will be composed of six women and two men, as two European sources linked to the Liberals confirmed to EUROPE on Wednesday, 20 March.
This Europe team, created in place of a single Spitzenkandidate, will be officially announced on Thursday.
Among the team's key figures are two liberal commissioners: Danish Competition Commissioner Margrethe Vestager (50) and her counterpart in Transport, Slovenian Violeta Bulc (55). The ALDE Group President in the European Parliament, Belgian Guy Verhofstadt (65), will also be part of the team.
Germany's Nicola Beer (49), head of the list for the FDP in Europe, Italy's Emma Bonino (71), whose Più Europa party has just joined the ALDE (see EUROPE 12191/3), and Hungary's Momentum Party founder and head of the list, Katalin Cseh (30), are also part of the team, as well as Ciudadanos' ALDE vice-president Luis Garicano (52).
While the Europe team was open to La République en Marche (LREM), which allied itself with ALDE, President Emmanuel Macron's French party - contrary to the principle of Spitzenkandidaten without transnational lists - did not wish to propose candidates.
In November, at the party congress in Madrid (see EUROPE 12135/4), a source explained to EUROPE that the team's objective was to have gender equality, but also a certain balance in terms of age and geography (North/South/East/West Europe). (Original version in French by Camille-Cerise Gessant)