“YesIn Therese Riberawhat could be the incentive for a European social democrat like the one who writes not to vote against this European Commission?”, writes the PSOE MEP on the social network Nicolas González Casares. European socialists launched a counterattack on Wednesday, threatening to bring down the entire college of commissioners of Ursula von der Leyen if the EPP does not give the green light to Ribera as executive vice-president in charge of Competition and Ecological Transition.
Socialists’ warning comes in the middle of a hungover day after the tense examination that the current vice-president of Pedro Sanchez in the European Chamber, during which the Popular Party and Vox criticized him for his management at DANA in Valencia and demanded his exclusion from the new European Commission. The evaluation of Ribera and the five other vice-presidents of the community executive has been postponed indefinitely as a result, among other factors, of this fight.
The President of the Commission has already been ratified by the European Parliament in July, but its team of commissioners still needs to be approved in a joint vote once all individual evaluations are complete. This vote is planned during the plenary session in the last week of November in Strasbourg and requires a simple majority of the votes cast. A majority which would be in danger if the socialists withdrew from the grand coalition agreement between popular, socialists, liberals and greens which allowed the election of Von der Leyen.
“The vote on the next college of the European Commission is at stake“, warned the European Socialist Group in the European Parliament in a press release. In the opinion of the socialists, it is precisely the rejection of Ribera by the EPP which is blowing up the grand coalition pact.
“The leader of European People’s Party (referring to German Manfred Weber) broke the political agreement of the pro-European democratic forces in the European Parliament in favor of the destructive program of the Spanish PP, which is trying to make Teresa Ribera the scapegoat for her inability to manage the most catastrophic floods in recent European history”, say the European socialists, whose leader is the Spaniard Iratxe Garciavery close to Pedro Sánchez.
According to him, the EPP has become “hostage” of its Spanish delegation“pushing the entire European Union to the brink in the most irresponsible way. “The EPP will have to explain to European citizens why they broke the historic pro-European majority and whether they really want to side with far-right populists.” » concludes the socialists’ declaration, which still leaves the door open to the search for a negotiated solution within the grand coalition.
After what happened in the Ribera exam, Ursula von der Leyen herself called an emergency meeting this Wednesday with the leaders of the political groups of the grand coalition: Manfred Weber, Iratxe García and the liberal Valérie Hayer. The President informed them that the current international situation requires rapid action from the European Union, which is why There should be no further delays in approving the new college of commissioners.
Von der Leyen maintains his confidence in Teresa Ribera after her leadership at DANA in Valencia. “Ribera is the one designated by the Spanish authorities for the position of commissioner, the European Parliament has an ongoing process of appearances and the president, of course, gave his confidence to Ribera and proposed her as commissioner,” he said. -he concluded. Von der Leyen’s main spokesman, Eric Mamer, was asked if he shared the European People’s Party’s criticism of the government’s third vice president for her handling of DANA.
