Parliament to grill rivals for key EU jobs

Date: 30/09/1999

By Gareth Harding

MEPS will play a key role in vetting candidates for two of the EU's top jobs over the next month when they hold hearings with those bidding to become the European Ombudsman and head of the Union's newly-created fraud-busting unit OLAF.

The fight for the post of Ombudsman looks like being the more gladiatorial of the two contests, after former Parliament Vice-President Georgios Anastassopoulos entered the ring at the last moment to challenge the present incumbent Jacob Soderman.

The Greek Christian Democrat is a shrewd operator who relishes a good scrap and is desperate to return to the European political stage after bowing out as an MEP at the June elections.

Describing Soderman's achievements as solid but unspectacular, Anastassopoulos insisted: "You cannot have an Ombudsman who is supposed to represent the citizens when the citizens do not know him." He added that, if elected, he would raise the profile of the position and campaign for the Ombudsman to be given more powers.

However, he faces an uphill task to dislodge Soderman from the post he has occupied for the past five years. The Finn has the support of the Socialists, Liberals and Greens in the Parliament and has been widely praised for his efforts to clean up the EU institutions before 'reform' became the buzzword in Brussels.

Soderman has launched more than 700 investigations into alleged malpractice in the Union's institutions and earlier this month stepped up his campaign for the European Commission to adopt a code of good administrative behaviour laying down what citizens have the right to expect of officials. Challenging President Romano Prodi to adopt the code, Soderman said that "if the new Commission fails to give this issue the priority it requires, it will be showing Europe's citizens that nothing has changed"

Supporters of the softly-spoken Finn say he has used his limited powers cleverly and claim their man is more committed to openness than his rival. "We know from earlier days that Anastassopoulos is not a fan of real transparency. Soderman has been a real champion of openness," said one.

The two men will have a chance to set out their respective stalls on 19 October when they appear before the assembly's petitions committee. The full Parliament will then deliver its verdict in November before the Ombudsman takes up his duties at the start of next year.

The timetable for appointing the first director of the new European anti-fraud office is even tighter, given Parliament's wish to see it up and running by the beginning of November.

So far, 150 people have applied for the post and these will be whittled down to seven candidates in time for public hearings before the budgetary control committee on 18 and 19 October.

MEPs will play a key role in vetting candidates for two of the EU's top jobs over the next month when they hold hearings with those bidding to become the European Ombudsman and head of the Union's newly-created fraud-busting unit OLAF.