The outgoing president of the Eurogroup, Paschal Donohoe, is the only candidate for his own succession, the Council of the European Union announced on Thursday 24 November.
The Eurogroup is therefore expected to reappoint him without difficulty on Monday 5 December, as a simple majority of the nineteen Member States - ten positive votes - is required. Mr Donohoe’s second mandate will begin on Friday 13 January 2023, for 2.5 years.
With a cabinet reshuffle due to take place in Ireland in mid-December in line with a coalition government agreement, Mr Donohoe had indicated to his counterparts that he will become Minister for Public Expenditure while continuing as President of the Eurogroup (see EUROPE 13058/12). Such a situation, where a state has two representatives around the table, has already arisen with Jean-Claude Juncker and Jeroen Dijsselbloem.
In his letter of motivation sent to ministers earlier this week, Mr Donohoe pledged to continue his work as an “honest broker” to ensure that decisions by the nineteen members are taken by consensus as far as possible. He wants to further strengthen coordination between ministers to ensure that fiscal policies do not increase inflationary pressure, that the digital euro project takes account of the Eurogroup’s guidelines and that a crisis management framework strengthens the Banking Union in the euro area.
On 1 January 2023, the euro area will welcome Croatia as its twentieth member.
See Mr Donohoe’s letter of motivation: https://aeur.eu/f/49h (Original version in French by Mathieu Bion)