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The vice-president of the liberals in the European Parliament João Cotrim de Figueiredo admitted today the vote against Ursula von der Leyen for president of the European Commission, for non-compliance with commitments and for dialoguing with the far right.
“This candidate is not fulfilling the commitments she had with the Renew Europe group, is having conversations with the European Conservatives and Reformists [ECR], a far-right group here in the [European] Parliament, and does not seem sufficiently committed to maintaining the solidity of the coalition that in the last legislature managed to lead the destinies of the European Union,” said João Cotrim de Figueiredo in the European Parliament (EP), in Brussels.
After a three-hour meeting between Ursula von der Leyen and MEPs belonging to Renew Europe to try to ensure the liberals’ vote in next week’s vote in Strasbourg (France), João Cotrim de Figueiredo admitted that the candidate may fail the election.
“If this stance does not change by the time of next week’s vote, the support of the Renew Europe group for von der Leyen’s re-candidacy and the entire package of posts under discussion is not guaranteed,” said the vice-president of the liberals.
In response to journalists’ insistence on the issue, João Cotrim de Figueiredo clarified his position: “My vote, at this moment, is no.”
Ursula von der Leyen, who is the European People’s Party (EPP) candidate for president of the community executive, is meeting this week with the political groups with the most representation in the EP to try to ensure re-election.
The vice-president of Renew Europe said that one of the priorities for the liberals in the next legislature is “economic growth”.
“Although the president of the Commission spent a good half hour talking about prosperity and the problems of European competitiveness, I was not convinced that the issue was sufficiently important for the next Commission,” he said.
“All this would be discussable and capable of persuasion if there were not a more important fundamental political problem,” he regretted.
Since the night of the European elections, on June 9, until today, Renew Europe has gone from the third-largest political group with the most representation in the hemicycle to the fifth, overtaken by the recently formed Patriots for Europe (far-right) and also by the ECR.
Asked if this fact led Ursula von der Leyen to prefer to talk to the far-right ECR, João Cotrim de Figueiredo replied that “if that is the case, it must be said”.
“And it must be assumed [by von der Leyen and the EPP] that there is a change of partners. Everyone will then draw their own conclusions about this. I understand the arithmetic, but I understand politics a little better and I think it is politics that will solve Europe’s problems,” he concluded.