To cram before a big oral exam, nothing beats the A5 format cardboard sheet, 14.8 cm x 21 cm. It took more than a hundred to summarize the issues of the portfolio promised to Stéphane Séjourné, France’s candidate for the European Commission. Key words and figures on the internal market, industrial policy, digital technology or even legislation on chemical products… everything must appear on the front of the famous sheets.
Since mid-September, the man who is to become the executive vice-president of the Commission in charge of Prosperity and Industrial Strategy has been working more than twelve hours every day. Emmanuel Macron’s short-lived Minister of Foreign Affairs is preparing a passing exam without equivalent in France – nothing like it for entering the government. In Brussels, all candidates nominated by their country must go through the grilling of the European Parliament committees. Without their green light, they cannot take office. And this is not a formality: in 2019, three candidates failed during their audition, including the centrist Sylvie Goulard, initially chosen by the French president, and finally replaced by Thierry Breton.
Moscovici only revised the day before
“When you are subjected to this exercise of more than three hours, live, without a collaborator, but with the cameras trained on you, you are obliged to demonstrate your competence. You must be able to react and not have your back against the wall” , told L’Express Michel Barnier, who took the test in January 2010, before taking care of the Internal Market and Financial Services. “I have never prepared for an exam so seriously,” admitted the current Prime Minister, who notably had to delve into the mysteries of the financial markets. The Savoyard had conscientiously prepared written answers to more than 300 potential questions. Five years later, Pierre Moscovici prefers to rely on his experience as a European deputy and incumbent of Bercy. It was only the day before his hearing, after a last dinner at a restaurant, that the future Commissioner for Economic Affairs looked at the A5 sheets printed for him! The next day, he was a little dry on technical questions regarding customs…
During reviews, candidates are only allowed two full-time collaborators, an administrator – most often the person who will subsequently manage their office – and an assistant. Currently, the future members of the second von der Leyen Commission are staying in small temporary offices at the “Charlemagne”, a building opposite the “Berlaymont”, the center of power which they will join on December 1, if everything goes as planned. . “There is a scout camp aspect, we all share the same printer and the coffee machine,” smiles one of the occupants of the place. It was also together that the contenders drafted the answers to the written questions submitted in advance by the deputies, in order to avoid contradictions which could trap them during their oral presentations.
Filter “psychopaths”
Everyone can call on the Commission’s services for help. Every five years, civil servants prepare “briefing books”, bibles on the important files that await the new team. They are available to come and detail the challenges facing Europe. Candidates are also trying to cajole the European Parliament before D-Day. During his lightning campaign in 2019, Thierry Breton practically camped in the corridors, in order to attract as many elected officials as possible. According to his entourage, Stéphane Séjourné lined up for 45-minute one-on-one meetings with the most influential deputies. The opportunity also to practice his English again (not as bad as people say) and his Spanish (he is bilingual), after an eight-month break in Paris. The former president of the centrist group in the European Parliament reactivated his contacts, meeting more than 100 MEPs out of 720.
“This period is central to establishing the major priorities of the mandate,” believes Thomas Pellerin-Carlin, recently elected among the social democrats. This expert on energy issues wants to see it as a democratic time “where the government of Europe presents its general orientations to have them validated by Parliament”. Old veteran of Strasbourg, the German Andreas Schwab is more cynical : “We went a little too far last time by bringing down three commissioners. “This time it is shaping up to be a mere procedural moment rather than a real review, as the hearings take place at the same time as the election American”, wants to believe this conservative elected official specializing in the internal market. Indeed, not the ideal moment to trigger a crisis which would delay the entry into office of the new Commission. “It will above all be a question of looking if there is no psychopath,” adds, deadpan, another pillar of Parliament.
Sylvie Goulard was doomed in advance
Behind the scenes, political groups have been spying on each other for weeks, banking on a balance of terror worthy of the American series House of cards. Of course, the group leaders all assure themselves that they will not shoot first. But in reality, strategists in each party are on guard. Because everyone knows that the elimination of the representative of one camp will cause collateral victims in other families. Thus, in 2019, the Macronists had largely contributed to the rejection of the Hungarian Lazslo Trocsanyi, labeled conservative, and the Romanian socialist Rovana Plumb, without realizing that they were simultaneously condemning… Sylvie Goulard! “We had decided to kill her even before her performance,” we candidly admit today in the ranks of the European right.
This fall, much attention has focused on Italian Raffaele Fitto. The left and the center cannot digest that this close friend of Giorgia Meloni has obtained one of the six vice-presidencies of the Commission. The conservatives’ less and less discreet flirtation with sovereignists and the far right is going badly. Valérie Hayer, who heads the centrist and liberal group, would have liked the envoy from Rome to bite the dust. But “if they touch Fitto, beware of the Spanish socialist Teresa Ribera and Stéphane Séjourné”, points out a strategist. The Elysée, scalded by the Goulard experience and by the thunderous resignation of Thierry Breton in September, put pressure so that nothing moves and that no misfortune happens to its foe.
Everything will become clearer on November 12, the date on which the vice-presidents will, after all the others (who will begin on the 5th), have their grand oral. This calendar, wanted by the right, makes it possible to link their fates. We will have to wait for this date to assess whether the 2024 year of European hearings is more a brutal balance of power or a democratic exercise. In the meantime, the candidates have no other choice but to continue cramming. In the home stretch, some have planned to practice via mock orals where their loved ones will play the role of the most biting MEPs.
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