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Europe's Greens pick McDonald's-dismantling activist for elections

29 January 2014, 17:34 CET
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(BRUSSELS) - French anti-globalisation activist Jose Bove, who once led the dismantling of a McDonald's by protesters, was chosen Wednesday to lead the Greens in this May's European Parliament elections.

But the low turnout in the group's primary, in which Bove and Germany's Ska Keller were picked, indicated there may be little appetite amongst European voters for the polls in four months' time.

Only 23,000 people took part in the online election for the Green primary, despite the party hoping to mobilise some 140,000 participants.

"It has to be said: Europe is not coming to the party," Bove told a press conference in Brussels as the results were announced.

Bove, 60, was elected by 11,790 votes while Italian rival Monica Frassoni won 5,851 votes.

Keller, 32, a former spokeswoman for the young Greens in the European parliament, received 11,726 votes against 8,170 for Rebecca Harms, also of Germany.

The Green group has 58 MEPs in the 766-seat European Parliament, the legislature of the 28-nation bloc.

Former farmer Bove won notoriety for leading enraged milk producers who tore down an under-construction McDonald's restaurant in Millau, southern France, in 1999.

They were protesting at American high-tech farming practices.

In 2008, he launched a hunger strike to call for a ban on the use of genetically-modified crops and the previous year he was convicted of tearing up GM crops.

Bove admitted that he had no chance of a shot at replacing European Commission president Jose Manuel Barroso, whose job as chief of the EU's executive arm is up for grabs in November.

"We are sane, we know we will not be finalists" to replace Barroso, he said, adding however that the Greens wanted to have a key role in the choice of the EU's new leaders.

Eurosceptic parties such as the UK Independence Party and Alternative for Germany are hoping to boost their numbers in the polls.

Turnout in European Parliament elections has fallen over the years from 62 percent in 1979 to 43 percent in 2009 and there are fears that this years could be even lower.


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