What the new European Commission will look like

The new European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, has made public her team of commissioners for the next five years

Bogdan Matei, 11.09.2019, 13:50

Soon the executive team led by
Jean-Claude Juncker will leave the European Commission, to make room for the
new European cabinet. Its president elect, Ursula von der Leyen, has already
presented in Brussels the list of commissioners and the structure of the new
Commission. Ursula von der Leyen promised to adopt new measures against climate
change, to consolidate the partnership with the United States and redefine
relations with China. Mrs. Von der Leyen claims her team will be balanced,
agile and modern, devoted to sustainable policies and a champion of
multilateralism.

Since Great Britain has made no nomination, the new Commission
will have 27 members, of whom 8 vice-presidents, including the High
Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, Josep Borrell of Spain.
The central policies of the new Commission will be coordinated over the next
five years by executive vice-presidents, as follows: Social-Democrat Frans
Timmermans of the Netherlands will be in charge of fighting climate change, Denmark’s
Liberal Margrethe Vestager will be in charge of digital competitiveness, while
Latvian Democrat Valdis Dombrovskis will take over the social and business
sector. The media writes that keeping Vestager at the helm of the fight against
the Silicon Valley-based US companies’ monopoly of European markets will most
likely attract criticism from the White House.

The appointment of Romanian MEP
Rovana Plumb as Commissioner for Transport was met with equal criticism in
Bucharest. A member of the Social-Democratic Party for the last 25 years, Plumb
has held repeated terms at the helm of the Environment, Labor, European Funds,
Education and Transport Ministries. The opposition says Rovana Plumb’s
integrity and set of skills make her utterly unfit for the job. In turn she claims
the opposition has done little for the country. Political pundits find it
ironical that Plumb should be appointed Transport Commissioner, considering
Romania has been struggling to build a motorway network and has reported little
improvement in decades in terms of modernizing its rail network.

Controversies
revolve around the other members of the new Commission as well. A case in point
is that of Sylvie Goulard of France, nominated for the position of Commissioner
for the Internal Market, the very day she was deposed by the French judicial
police in a case involving fictional jobs. A considerable amount of uproar was
caused by von der Leyen’s decision to make migration part of a wider portfolio
dubbed protecting our European way of life, a label the left-wing Greens have
found frightening. According to procedures, the designated Commissioners will
appear before the relevant Parliament committees, with Parliament expected to
cast its final vote afterwards. Once the Commission is approved by Parliament,
the European Council will formally appoint the European Commission.

(Translated by V. Palcu)