Juncker on track to win approval for new Commission
Violeta Bulc - Photo © European Union 2014 EP
(STRASBOURG) - The EU's incoming chief executive Jean-Claude Juncker appeared on track Tuesday to win formal approval for his new team that will have to tackle Europe's economic and foreign policy challenges.
European parliament committees approved Juncker's last two choices for the European Commission, the 28-member team that will lead the EU for the next five years, parliamentary sources said.
Following interviews on Monday, the committees gave the thumbs-up to Violeta Bulc -- a controversial Slovenian candidate who was named at short notice after parliament rejected her predecessor -- and Slovakia's Maros Sefcovic who was appointed to a new role in the ensuing reshuffle.
Parliament is due to vote in Strasbourg on Wednesday on Juncker's new European Commission in its entirety. If it passes, Juncker's team can start its mandate as planned on November 1.
The spectre of a delay had been raised after a parliamentary committee rejected Slovenia's former prime minister Alenka Bratusek.
It prompted Juncker into carrying out a reshuffle when he proposed Bulc, a little known Slovenian deputy premier and telecoms entrepreneur, for the post of transport commissioner.
Juncker then moved Sefcovic from the transport role to become vice president for energy union, the high-profile role originally earmarked for Bratusek.
Juncker's team is due to replace that of Jose Manuel Barroso, who is the outgoing president of the European Commission, which heads a bloc of 28 nations and 500 million people.
In a farewell address to parliament after two five-year terms, Barroso said the EU had weathered the financial and sovereign debt crisis better than anyone had predicted.
With some member states on the verge of default, he recalled, critics wrongly predicted Greece's exit from the eurozone single currency bloc and even the implosion of the European Union.
He said Portugal and Ireland have exited their international bailout programmes successfully and other countries, which were on the verge of collapse, are now more stable.
"We are stronger (today) because we have a more integrated system of governance, because we have legislation to tackle abuses in the financial markets, because we have a much clearer system of supervision and regulation," Barroso told parliament.
"I think now we are better prepared than we were before to face crises," he added.
The Juncker Commission takes over as the European economy is on the verge of stalling completely, new worries have emerged about Greece, there is a risk of spillover from turmoil in the Middle East and the fallout from the Ukraine crisis continues to poison relations with Russia.