01/06/2004 (Agence Europe) - Tuesday's edition of the Guardian indicated that Tony Blair is not completely convinced by the candidacy of Guy Verhofstadt for the presidency of the European Commission (EUROPE 28 May p 5). The Manchester published daily affirms that the Belgian prime minister had personally appealed to his British counterpart seeking his support but during a private dinner of European affairs ministers, which included Dennis MacShane from Britain, 7 ministers out of 14 supported the candidacy of Antonio Vitorino as successor to Romano Prodi with 3 supporting Anders Fogh Rasmussen. In a letter to the Financial Times on Tuesday, Professor Stuart Holland, who worked with Harold Wilson, Jacques Delors, Andreas Papandreou and Antonio Guterres, put the name of the former Portuguese Socialist prime minister into the hat as a candidate for the Commission presidency. The Lisbon Agenda of Antonio Guterres is still one of the EU's priorities, pointed out Stuart Holland.