Purely mathematical The EPP, the Socialists and the Liberals have the majority – over 400 votes in the EP, a majority of 361 votes should have been easily achieved, Meloni is not needed to vote Ursula von der Leyen as EC President.
This is what Vesela Cherneva, deputy director of the European Council for Foreign Policy (EECP) and head of the Sofia office, commented in an interview with BNR, whether George Meloni holds the key to Ursula von der Leyen's second term.
According to her, "it is believed that there will be people dissatisfied with Ursula in all three factions in the EP".
"Therefore, it is considered risky to proceed in an isolated and confrontational manner with regard to Meloni. I think that if it comes to a situation that Ursula von der Leyen does not get enough votes – July 17, the entire package must be negotiated all over again. Only then can one think about a share of Meloni's conservatives in the distribution of the big posts, which means that the vote for the EC will be towards the end of the year. These are scenarios if 3 centrist factions do not gather the necessary votes," Vesela Cherneva explained.
And predicts:
"If this package goes through now, it follows that Meloni will have to comply with the centrist consensus and there will be more room for Italian Mario Draghi, who was tasked with producing a report on Europe's competitiveness to advise Brussels and the European capitals how to reform the market to create large super companies to compete in the global market."
"Even on Monday, things changed. It became clear that the EPP had made 2 planning mistakes. The first is that their own greed for posts created a problem, because the Croatian Prime Minister proposed that the EPP also get half of the mandate of the President of the European Council. In practice, to have participation in 3 out of 4 posts. It blew the balance. The other wrong approach was that von der Leyen's staff decided to hold preliminary talks with socialists and liberals without consulting Meloni, who would have just chaired the G7. On a personal level, the consensus player was shaken. Against this background, Babis' decision to leave the Liberal group was expected and many people expected it to happen. Babis is under investigation for corruption. His departure consolidates the fourth place of the liberals in the EP", comments Vesela Cherneva, what has changed in the new EP after yesterday's decision of Andrei Babish.
And added:
"I don't think that his departure is bad news and that it has, who knows, any significance for the distribution of the four big posts, because Babis has long stubbornly separated himself from the consensus in the liberal center."
"For me, the question is where he would go, and there is increasing talk that, like Orban, Babis may try to create an alternative parliamentary group, since he and Orban cannot find a place in the existing configuration." , predicted Cherneva.
According to her, the duel in the EP will not be Meloni – Macron, rather Meloni vs. Scholz, "because Macron is busy with the parliamentary elections in France, called them early after the defeat of the EP elections".