{"id":388994,"date":"2024-09-11T16:43:30","date_gmt":"2024-09-11T14:43:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/2024\/09\/11\/fitto-commissione-maggioranza-opposizione\/"},"modified":"2024-09-16T19:41:58","modified_gmt":"2024-09-16T17:41:58","slug":"raffaele-fitto-clash-between-majority-and-opposition-continues-as-von-der-leyen-negotiates","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/2024\/09\/11\/raffaele-fitto-clash-between-majority-and-opposition-continues-as-von-der-leyen-negotiates\/","title":{"rendered":"Raffaele Fitto, clash between majority and opposition continues, as von der Leyen negotiates"},"content":{"rendered":"

Brussels – What we might now call “the Fitto affair<\/i>”\u00a0<\/i><\/strong>continues to hold sway, at least among the corridors of Brussels. Ever since the officialdom of the nomination of the current Minister of European Affairs, Raffaele Fitto<\/strong>, as the Italian candidate for the next EU Commission<\/strong>, a whirlwind of statements, denials, accusations and counter-accusations related to his possible nomination as one of the executive vice-presidents has been set in motion. Even to the point of dusting off the events of five years ago, when the Dem Paolo Gentiloni<\/strong> received the\u00a0green light from conservative MEPs as a member of the first von der Leyen College (but there was no vote in which Italian ECR exponents expressed themselves). On the Italian side, the issue revolves around whether the name indicated by Rome should be supported as the candidate of the country rather than of the government<\/strong>, as the centre-right demands.\u00a0In the EU Parliament, on the other hand, there are growing protests from the pro-European majority partners (Socialists, Greens, and Liberals) against the assignment of an\u00a0executive vice-presidency<\/strong>\u00a0of the EU executive to an\u00a0extreme right-wing exponent<\/strong>.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

On Wednesday (September 11), Commission President-elect Ursula von der Leyen was supposed to present her team for the five years 2024\u20132029<\/strong> to the European Parliament. Instead, the appointment has been postponed<\/a> to September 17, during the Strasbourg Plenary, and in Brussels, the debate continues over Fitto<\/strong>‘s candidacy for the vice presidency (one of the expected four or five) of the second college led by the German popular leader, and the negotiations that the Commission chairwoman is conducting with political forces and governments<\/strong> continue.\u200b<\/span><\/p>\n

As has long been known, Italy’s\u00a0premier, Giorgia Meloni,<\/strong>\u00a0would like for her loyalist an\u00a0economic portfolio<\/strong>\u2014the one for which the nickname “mister trillion” has already been coined, about the possible budget and\/or NextGenerationEu assignment\u2014and, above all, a “weighty role<\/strong>” within the next Commission.<\/span>\u00a0This, translated, means an\u00a0executive vice-presidency<\/strong>, which would place him (along with Spanish socialist Teresa Ribera, French liberal Thierry Breton,<\/span>\u00a0and Latvian popular Valdis Dombrovskis) in the inner\u00a0circle of the most powerful commissioners. However, reiterated by the government allies, Lega and Forza Italia, these demands have given rise to a political case between Rome and Brussels<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

At the European Parliament,<\/strong> the list of the political forces<\/strong> to which von der Leyen owes her reappointment and who oppose the conferral<\/strong> of a role as executive vice-president<\/strong> for a member of a party, the Conservatives and Reformists (ECR)<\/strong>, which they consider radical right-wing and with which they have long declared they will not cooperate,\u00a0is growing longer. After the stop\u00a0from the Liberals (Renew)<\/strong> and the Greens (G\/EFA)<\/strong>, yesterday\u00a0<\/a>also arrived<\/a>\u00a0the warning from the Socialists (S&D)<\/strong>, who are lying in wait\u00a0for the president-elect: “proactively bringing ECR into the heart of the Commission<\/strong>,” read a note yesterday (September 10), is a good recipe “for losing the support of progressives<\/strong>.”<\/p>\n

However, the Social Democratic front in the Parliament\u00a0is not united, as the Democratic Party<\/strong>, the largest part\u00a0of the S&D group, has instead expressed its support towards Fitto’s candidacy through the voice of Nicola Zingaretti<\/strong>, the head of the delegation. “We welcome a weighty role for Italy; we<\/strong>\u00a0defend this prerogative,” the former Lazio governor told the press, adding that “we will judge Commissioner Fitto without any prejudice.” It seems, in the words of their head of delegation, that the Dems are thus intent on responding affirmatively to the call<\/strong>, launched by the government on several occasions<\/a>, to support the minister in Europe<\/strong> going<\/strong> beyond party divisions<\/strong>. It seems, however, that the delegation is divided and that a large part of the Dem deputies still want to block the nomination.<\/p>\n

Carlo Calenda<\/strong>, secretary of Action<\/strong> (which is affiliated with Renew in Europe, although it did not elect representatives to the EU Parliament last June), said that “we should support” Fitto (whom he calls a moderate) because “the fact that we do not like the government does not mean that we should not have a representative in the European Commission of weight and value<\/strong>.”<\/p>\n

Representatives of Fratelli d’Italia<\/strong>, Lega<\/strong> and Forza Italia<\/strong> went even further, claiming that the opposition’s support for the Melonian candidate<\/strong> (“rallying around him,” in the words of Forza Italia\u00a0MEP Salvatore De Meo) is almost a due act to reciprocate<\/strong> the one provided in autumn 2019<\/strong>. At the time, when the red\/yellow government had just taken office, Paolo Gentiloni easily passed the hearings<\/strong> of the MEPs. He took up his duties as commissioner of the economy, thanks to the absence of opposition<\/a> from the centre-right<\/strong> MEPs, who were then in opposition in Rome.<\/p>\n

In the reconstruction of events five years ago, when von der Leyen was composing her first college, some passages ended up being lined up in a somewhat disingenuous manner. Gentiloni was indeed\u00a0approved without a fuss in the parliamentary committee, but, as the Pentastellist MEP Gaetano Pedull\u00e0<\/strong> correctly recalled, it is inaccurate to say, as some on the right claim, that Fratelli d’Italia voted in favour of the Italian commissioner. On that occasion, he recalls, “no vote was held<\/strong> because Gentiloni’s candidacy passed during the coordinators’ meeting<\/strong>, which was behind closed doors, and no FdI MEP was part of it.”\u00a0Fratelli d’Italia, however, then voted for confidence in the von der Layen I Commission as a whole.<\/span><\/p>\n

The political crux<\/strong>\u00a0of the whole issue is that the problem is not so much Fitto’s\u00a0profile<\/strong> (hard to see him as a dangerous extremist, given that his political trajectory has always been closer to the centre than the right<\/a>), as it is, at least for the Populars’ allies in the “Ursula 2.0<\/strong>,” getting someone from the ECR into the most coveted control\u00a0rooms, effectively breaking a cordon sanitaire<\/strong> that had resisted\u00a0until now.<\/p>\n

“The real contradiction,” said Dem MEP Matteo Ricci<\/strong>, is that of Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, “who with the ECR group takes sides against Von der Leyen<\/strong> and her pro-European agenda and then appoints an Italian commissioner from her own party who should follow that agenda<\/strong>.”\u00a0Moreover, after abstaining<\/a>\u00a0in the European Council on the German lady’s second term at the Berlaymont palace and making FdI MEPs\u00a0vote against her reappointment<\/a>.<\/span>\u00a0In all likelihood, however, the Fitto affair will\u00a0not end anytime soon, as the hearings for commissioner candidates<\/strong> could drag on, in the\u00a0worst-case scenario, until late November<\/strong>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Amid mutual accusations and reenactments of historical falsehoods, the controversy over the responsibility of parties to defend the alleged “national interest” regardless of political positions is not yet over. And in Rome and Brussels, short circuits are already being counted<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7876,"featured_media":388960,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"episode_type":"","audio_file":"","podmotor_file_id":"","podmotor_episode_id":"","cover_image":"","cover_image_id":"","duration":"","filesize":"","filesize_raw":"","date_recorded":"","explicit":"","block":"","jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":{"source_name":"","source_url":"","via_name":"","via_url":"","override_template":"0","override":[{"template":"1","single_blog_custom":"","parallax":"1","fullscreen":"1","layout":"right-sidebar","sidebar":"default-sidebar","second_sidebar":"default-sidebar","sticky_sidebar":"1","share_position":"top","share_float_style":"share-monocrhome","show_share_counter":"0","show_view_counter":"0","show_featured":"1","show_post_meta":"1","show_post_author":"1","show_post_author_image":"1","show_post_date":"1","post_date_format":"default","post_date_format_custom":"Y\/m\/d","show_post_category":"1","show_post_reading_time":"0","post_reading_time_wpm":"300","post_calculate_word_method":"str_word_count","show_zoom_button":"0","zoom_button_out_step":"2","zoom_button_in_step":"3","show_post_tag":"1","show_prev_next_post":"1","show_popup_post":"1","number_popup_post":"1","show_author_box":"0","show_post_related":"1","show_inline_post_related":"0"}],"override_image_size":"0","image_override":[{"single_post_thumbnail_size":"crop-500","single_post_gallery_size":"crop-500"}],"trending_post":"0","trending_post_position":"meta","trending_post_label":"Trending","sponsored_post":"0","sponsored_post_label":"Sponsored by","sponsored_post_name":"","sponsored_post_url":"","sponsored_post_logo_enable":"0","sponsored_post_logo":"","sponsored_post_desc":"","disable_ad":"0"},"jnews_primary_category":{"id":"","hide":""},"jnews_override_counter":{"override_view_counter":"0","view_counter_number":"0","override_share_counter":"0","share_counter_number":"0","override_like_counter":"0","like_counter_number":"0","override_dislike_counter":"0","dislike_counter_number":"0"},"footnotes":""},"categories":[25681],"tags":[25747,28143,28149,27427,26096,26581,26064,28871],"class_list":["post-388994","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-politics","tag-brothers-ditalia-en-2","tag-brothers-ditaly","tag-party-democratic-en","tag-commissione-europea-en","tag-conservatives-and-reformers-en","tag-giorgia-meloni-en","tag-raffaele-fitto-en-3"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/388994","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7876"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=388994"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/388994\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":389121,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/388994\/revisions\/389121"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/388960"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=388994"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=388994"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=388994"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}