On the eve of the launch of the Renew Europe Now campaign for the European elections on Wednesday 20 March in Brussels, European Liberals, Centrists and Democrats officially presented their main candidates for the Renew Europe Group’s “Team Europe” in the European Parliament.
The Renew Europe group, currently the third largest political force in the European Parliament, is made up of the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe (ALDE), the European Democratic Party (EDP) and non-affiliates, including MEPs from the French presidential party Renaissance.
These three bodies have now selected their respective representatives on “Team Europe”, who will represent the Renew Europe Now platform in the forthcoming European debates with the Spitzenkandidaten from the other major political families.
The ALDE has selected Germany’s Marie-Agnes Strack-Zimmermann (see EUROPE 13368/7), defence policy spokeswoman for the FDP (Free Democratic Party) parliamentary group in the German Bundestag and chair of the Bundestag’s defence committee.
The latter will undoubtedly place European defence at the heart of the political family’s priorities, which will be presented on 20 March. She stated that “Europe is humanity’s greatest peace project. After centuries of violent conflicts, the creation of a unified Europe has been an incredible achievement”, and added that she would continue to fight “for a democratic and free Europe”.
The EDP has chosen the Italian Sandro Gozi (see EUROPE 13371/1), who is the current Secretary General of the party and a Renaissance MP, but also a former Italian Secretary of State for European Affairs under the Renzi and Gentiloni governments.
Ahead of the campaign launch, he pledged “to rise to the challenges of history. This is one of those moments: let’s reform the Union to unite Europe”.
The non-affiliates, meanwhile, ended up validating the nomination of French MEP Valérie Hayer, current chair of the Renew Europe group (see EUROPE 13336/22) and top of the Renaissance party list (see EUROPE 13361/35).
Referring also to “a troubled world”, she said that a strong European Union was necessary “to protect our citizens, preserve our democracies and ensure a sustainable and prosperous future for our children”. Lastly, she explained that the June elections were crucial and reiterated that “we cannot allow populists to compromise our common destiny”. (Original version in French by Pauline Denys)