Bonino blasts Kallas over staff reshuffle

Italy’s European Affairs Minister Emma Bonino has written to the Commission to complain that last week’s staff reshuffle failed to put any Italians in top jobs.

In a letter sent to Administrative Affairs Commissioner Siim Kallas on 29 November, Bonino, a former commissioner, said; "I do not like the music" of the latest round of "musical chairs".

"After this odd series of French and German appointments, there is some expectation that the Commission might start appointing somebody else as well," she writes.

She said the old approach where each member states received a "fair share" of upper management positions was "more logical and no less transparent".

Last week the Commission reshuffled 35 senior officials, promoting two Germans to head its delegation to the World Trade Organization in Geneva and to director-general for regional policy. A Frenchman was promoted to deputy secretary-general.

A Commission spokes-man said: "You must recognise that with the wave of decisions the variations which are a result stay within the statistical complexity of a system where you should not aim at 100% mathematical balance."

In May an Italian Director-General Enzo Moavero Milanesi left the Commission to become a member of the Court of First Instance. The vacant post is provisionally being filled by Portuguese national Maria da Graça Carvalho.

Italy’s European Affairs Minister Emma Bonino has written to the Commission to complain that last week’s staff reshuffle failed to put any Italians in top jobs.