Ten Commission nominees receive backing from Prodi

By David Cronin and Martin Banks

Date: 12/02/04

EUROPEAN Commission President Romano Prodi has given his blessing to ten nominee commissioners from the incoming member states who are set to join the College from May to the end of October, when the current administration's five-year mandate ends.

The newcomers, who will earn €18,000 each month, will shadow existing commissioners until then.

Their appointments are subject to confirmation hearings in the European Parliament on 13-15 April. The ten are:

Danuta Hübner (Poland)

"A Europhile in a country of sceptics," was how Le Monde once described Europe Minister Danuta Hübner.

The tag may be simplistic, given that Poland has some 39 million inhabitants, but it is true Hübner has spent the past few years trying to balance her own enthusiasm for closer European integration with a dogged defence of Poland's interests.

One of the most visible figures on the "Yes" side during her country's EU referendum last year, she has also flanked premier Leszek Miller at his most obdurate.

Her eagerness to work in the external trade field at the Commission can perhaps be explained by her career background. Along with stints as a journalist, Berkeley-educated Hübner was a senior UN official in Geneva.

Siim Kallas (Estonia)

Despite being a member of the Soviet Communist Party in 1972-90, the former union activist became one of the most vocal advocates of independence from the Kremlin. In 1989, then a journalist with newspaper Voice of Youth, he was among the authors of Wonder, a blueprint for severing economic links with the USSR.

His vision bore fruit in 1992 when, as governor of Estonia's central bank, Kallas did the groundwork for replacing the rouble with the kroon.

He confounded predictions that the new currency would flop, but has also advocated a cautious monetary approach recently by disagreeing with those who seek to make Estonia the first ex-Soviet bloc country to join the euro.

Founder of the Reform Party in 1995, he has held the posts of foreign minister, finance minister and prime minister.

There has been speculation that members of the centre-right European People's Party might object to his communist past when he appears before a confirmation hearing in the Parliament in April. Kallas, however, has long converted to free market capitalism. Not surprisingly, then, he is interested in shadowing either Pedro Solbes (economics and monetary affairs) or Michaele Schreyer (budget).

Jan Figel (Slovakia)

Prime Minister Mikulas Dzurinda might have been happy to have Christian Democrat Figel as chief negotiator on the terms of Slovakia's EU entry, but he wasn't initially enamoured with the idea of sending him to Brussels full-time.

Dzurinda's preferred choice for the post was Coca-Cola manager Ivan Stefanec.

There was also much dissent within the ruling coalition about the nominee, with deputy premier Pál Csáky stating that Figel would be unsuitable as his party has eurosceptic tendencies. Nevertheless, few could doubt that Figel has become one of the foremost experts on the EU's labrynthine procedures in his country.

He has shown a willingness to work with the Commission's research chief Philippe Busquin.

Sandra Kalniete (Latvia)

If luck is on her side, Sandra Kalniete could have two reasons to celebrate in May. First, the foreign minister's ambition of bringing Latvia into the EU will be realized. Second, Elle magazine will be announcing its book of the year award, for which her autobiography, With Dancing Shoes in Siberian Snow, has been nominated.

The book recounts her childhood in Siberia, to where her parents and grandparents were deported following the Red Army's invasion of Latvia in 1941.

One of the key players in Latvia's independence movement during the early 1990s, Kalniete has since been Riga's ambassador to France.

She has been known to cross swords with Moscow. Last December, she said it was unacceptable for Russian parliamentarians to complain about ethnic Russian children in her country being taught a mainly Latvian curriculum.

Dalia Grybauskaite (Lithuania)

One newspaper profile termed her thus: "The tough-as-nails finance minister who transformed the country's economy from Baltic laggard to Baltic tiger."

Dalia Grybauskaite has been one of the most vocal critics of the Common Agricultural Policy in central and eastern Europe, arguing that it eats up far too much of the EU's financial resources.

Hoping to work in either the budget or economics field at the Commission, she also has a good knowledge of transatlantic relations, having been a senior diplomat in Lithuania's US Embassy for several years.

Her name has been mentioned in the Vilnius' rumour mill as a possible successor to President Rolandas Paksas, who has been embarrassed by a leaked secret service report linking him to an organized crime network and to Russia's security services.

Milos Kuzvart (Czech Republic)

Like neighbouring Slovakia, there has been a lively debate in the Czech coalition about who it should nominate. Favoured candidates included Ivana Janu, a judge at the war crimes tribunal for the former Yugoslavia in The Hague, Bedrich Modran, a former environment minister, and Pavel Telicka, head of Prague's EU mission.

But eventually Vladimir Spidla's government plumped for Kuzvart, who was environment minister in 1998-2000.

At 43, he will be the youngest member of the Commission. His green credentials notwithstanding (before the 1989 revolution, he campaigned against building a power station on the Krivoklat nature reserve), he appears more interested in shadowing External Relations Commissioner Chris Patten than Environment Commissioner Margot Wallström.

Janez Potocnik (Slovenia)

Back in 1998, this economist and erstwhile long-jump champion was one of the authors of Slovenia's accession strategy.

It proposed far-reaching changes, including pension and tax reform and the privatization of state-owned banks.

Since then, he has been the country's ever-so-meticulous chief negotiator with the EU as well as Europe minister. Not linked to any party, he has been able to stay above the political fray.

"Of course, Slovenia will be just a small piece in the great European mosaic," he once remarked. "But for us it means security, stability and prosperity.

"And we shall finally be able to show our Balkan neighbours that there is light at the end of the tunnel."

He is believed to have his eye on the Commission's agriculture portfolio, but so too has Malta's Joe Borg.

Péter Bálazs (Hungary)

"We like each other but there has been a bit less love than before," Bálazs said in 2002, at a time when would-be member states were peeved that the EU-15 did not want to be over-generous in allocating agricultural or regional policy aid.

Keen to shadow Regional Policy Commissioner Michel Barnier, Bálazs has more recently been examining how money can be saved by the Union. He believes too much goes to the CAP and that the translation bill should be kept under control by encouraging wider use of English and French as common languages.

The 62-year-old left-winger has been Europe minister, chief EU negotiator, a member of the Convention on the future of Europe and - for the past year - ambassador to Brussels.

Joe Borg (Malta)

A cartoon on satirical website maltafly.com depicts Foreign Minister Borg boarding The Titanic with Eddie Fenech Adami, who has announced he is stepping down as prime minister.

Last year, however, Borg argued cogently that it was the opposition Labour Party's "No to EU" campaign that would leave the island sunk because it would deprive it of aid.

A former lecturer in company law, Borg later became an official in Valletta's foreign ministry where he wrote a strategy paper for how Malta could accede to the EU.

It was published in 1990 - 14 years ahead of its time.

Marcos Kyprianou (Cyprus)

Cambridge-educated lawyer Kyprianou has been active in Cypriot politics since he was elected a municipal councillor in Nicosia in 1986.

He has been a parliamentary leader for the Democratic Party, and a chairman of the financial and budgetary affairs committee in the parliament before being appointed finance minister last year.

Part of his job has involved pricing the plan, sponsored by UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan, on reunifying Cyprus. His ministry reckons implementing it would cost €28 billion. Interestingly, this analysis was based on studying the reunification of a far larger country - Germany.The newcomers, who will earn €18,000 each month, will shadow existing commissioners until then.

Their appointments are subject to confirmation hearings in the European Parliament on 13-15 April. The ten are:

Ten nominee Commissioners from the Member States set to join the European Union in May 2004 are to shadow existing Commissioners from May until the end of October 2004 when the current Commission's five-year mandate ends. Article provides brief background information on each nominee.