Romania sends two proposals for European commissioner

Romania’s new Government will send European Commission (EC) president-elect Ursula von der Leyen two proposals for the commissioner position, prime minister Ludovic Orban announced at the end of the Government meeting on Wednesday, November 6. The two proposals are MEPs Siegfried Muresan and Adina Valean.

Orban added that he would ask the Romanian Parliament to hear the two candidates or the one accepted by the EC president-elect.

Orban’s favorite for the commissioner position is Siegfried Muresan, according to liberal sources quoted by G4Media.ro, while Adina Valean is the reserve candidate.

However, the EC president would prefer a woman commissioner for Romania and the leader of the Socialist group in the European Parliament, the second-biggest by number of mandates, has conditioned its vote for the von der Leyen commission on having a woman-candidate for Romania, to get closer to gender balance in the new executive team in Brussels. Currently, von de Leyen’s team has 15 men and 11 women. Moreover, the Socialists are unhappy that they have lost a seat in the new commission after the change of government in Romania.

The new commissioner candidates proposed by Romania, Hungary and France should be heard by the European Parliament’s specialty committees on November 14, and the new European Commission should get the European Parliament’s endorsement in a plenary session on November 27, according to G4Media.ro.

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