Power struggles within EU continue and now it’s payback time

BRUSSELS has become a ghost town as governments and the EU institutions have departed on holiday.

But despite the eerie hush around Schuman, the power struggles within the European Union continue, promising to make it a cool and excruciating summer for some.

The big states are positioning themselves to ensure they get the important roles they want within the European Commission; Commission president Jose Manuel Barroso tries to keep the job for a second five years while the European Parliament pursues its own agenda.

All positions in the parliament have been allocated – presidents of the political groups, the parliament president, the vice presidents, heads of delegations and quaestors. Now they are turning their attention to their fellow institutions a kilometre away on Schuman, and their main focus is Barroso.

The commission and its president are not supposed to dance to anybody’s tune but to protect the interests of the union as a whole. But desperate to keep his job the former Portuguese prime minister has been doing the bidding of member states for the past five years.

Now is payback time and it should have been easy.

With the backing of the European People’s Party (EPP), the parliament’s largest political group, and leaders of the 27 member states confirming that he is their nominee, he should be heading off for a relaxed holiday secure he was coming back to a job.

But this is politics. The parliament, seeing how he has hopped to the tune of the member states, want to see him perform similarly for them as they have equal say in most legislation with the council.

So even as the EPP confirms Barroso as their choice, they are putting the screws on him behind the scenes. They have a list of legislation they want from the commission, not least regulation of the banks and the financial sector demanded by their furious voters.

Having promised in public to deal with his nomination in September, they are threatening to put it off until November or December using the Irish referendum as pretext.

The man applying the pressure is Joseph Daul, the head of the EPP. The fact that he is French gives a clue to the other agenda at work here.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy has publicly supported Barroso but this robs him of room for negotiation in the vital play for the important jobs coming up, including the permanent president of the council and, perhaps more importantly, senior commissioner posts of competition and internal market.

The French will wanteither competition or the internal market post. But most will want to keep them out of these posts fearing they would allow a free for all in state aid and domestic industry protection.

But Mr Sarkozy might insist on getting the job of commission president for his prime minister, Francoise Fillon, who he wants to get rid of. So the other member states will be faced with a choice – back Barroso and give France a plum commission portfolio, or ditch Barroso and keep the French away from the competition and internal market jobs.

All three institutions need the balance of power to be restored with a strong largely independent commission. The smaller states have the most to gain from a strong commission, but so far they have been unable or unwilling to assert themselves.

A lack of real leadership allows the power games to continue among small men grasping for whatever spoil they can get but with no thought to what the overall objective should be.