End of Barroso II Commission Term
Jose Manuel Barroso says one of his greatest achievements was the EU enlargement.
Mihai Pelin, 30.10.2014, 13:46
For the last time on Tuesday Jose Manuel Barroso chaired a meeting of the European Commission as its president. At the end of his 10-year term in office, he told a press conference that he was proud to leave this post knowing that he helped the 28-country bloc stay united through one of the most severe economic crises of the past decades. In his opinion, he leaves Europe “stronger and better equipped,” and added that in spite of hesitations from various capitals, it was possible to strengthen the EU institutional framework.
His legacy primarily includes tighter budget rules, strengthened fiscal policies and the start of the banking union construction. Barroso also mentioned the benefits of the enlargement process that he coordinated. “Imagine for a minute,” Barroso said, “that those countries had not joined the EU when they did. In that case, probably we would not be only discussing now about Ukraine. We would probably be discussing now about Bulgaria. Or about the Baltic states. So it was the right thing to do.”
Since 2004, when Barroso took over the EC presidency, the number of member states has almost doubled, from 15 to 28, and the number of Eurozone countries has risen from 13 to 19. The EU enlargement was one of the greatest achievements of the contemporary EU construction process, Jose Manuel Barroso emphasized.
As news agencies comment, the end of Barroso’s term in office is shadowed by the rise of anti-European sentiment and of British euro-skepticism, which questions the strength of the EU project. The outgoing EC president said he regretted the hesitations of some member states and the lack of solidarity on certain decisions, and explained that the most disquieting elements are the citizens’ lack of confidence in the European institutions and the issue of social injustice, which the new Commission will have to tackle.
Since its EU accession in 2007, Romania has been represented in the European Commission by Leonard Orban as Commissioner for Multilingualism, followed by Dacian Ciolos as Agriculture Commissioner. In the new College, headed by Luxembourg’s Jean Claude Juncker, the Romanian MEP Corina Cretu will be the new Commissioner for Regional Policy.
