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Onesta: the ball is in the Socialists' camp
The Green candidate for the presidency of the European Union, Gérard Onesta, believes it is up to the European Socialists to change the balance of forces for the elections, as the only way of defeating the favourite Pat Cox, candidate of Liberals-Conservatives, is for the Socialists to support the Green candidate. Mr Onesta warns that the Greens decided they wanted a candidate from a small group, and they would support Mr Cox and not the Socialist candidate, if the Green candidate has no chance. "If they want to loose alone, it is their choice: but my group wants a president from a small group - it will be either me, or Pat Cox."
Gérard Onesta believes it is important for the parliament at this stage of its existence as an institution to have a president issued from a small group, as this would be the best guarantee for reforms within the institution. "In order to embody the plurality of balances within the Parliament, it is better if the President is issued, for once, not from the two groups that dominated the Parliament for so long: a small group president can be the guarantee for reforms," M Onesta said.
Scenarios of alliances after the first ballot Therefore, the Green candidate imagines different scenarios after the first ballot: if no candidate gets the absolute majority after the first round (which is probable), either the Socialists vote en masse for him, to counter the Conservative candidate, or the Socialists ask Mr Cox to break the accord with the Conservatives and declare he is not a candidate of the EPP and Liberals, in order to seek general support from all parties. It is however not likely that Mr Cox breaks the alliance made two and a half years ago with the Conservatives, which is almost certainly giving him the presidency of the Parliament.
After the first round everything will be decided Mr Onesta believes it will be after the first round that everything will be decided, according to how the Socialists decide to vote. He thinks everything is not lost for him: "I am not a favourite, but on paper I still have chances to win the elections: one needs around 280 votes, and mathematically it is still possible for me to gather that number."
Parliament converted to democracy The Green candidate says that the present electoral campaign converted the parliament to the democracy game: "there is something going on these days: there is a campaign, a TV debate, interviews, the press. The elections created a window of political explanations, presentation of projects." Two ideas dominated the campaign, for Mr Onesta: need of equity and pluralism within the European Parliament, including the protection of minorities, and the necessity of reforms. He also believes that he has an advantage in comparison to the other candidates as he pushed through reformist ideas while working as vice-president of the Parliament, for example on solving the question of a statute for MEPs assistants. Moreover, Mr Onesta believes he is "free to speak and act" as "I do not have a Green prime minister or president of an EU country to pick up the phone and tell me what to do, while the EU countries are dominated by Conservatives and Socialists."
His priorities Concerning his priorities as head of the European Parliament, Mr Onesta believes that the reforms prepared by the Convention on the future of Europe and the enlargement process are crucial: "We live in a historical period, we started as Parliament our work under a Treaty, and we'll finish in 2004 ruled by a constitution, maybe. We are in the process of writing the history. This history cannot be written without citizens, and the most direct link with the citizens is the Parliament. My priority is to build a Europe with no democratic deficit."
Mr Gérard Onesta wants a European constitution of federal type, with two chambers, one representing the diversity (the EU states, representatives of the National Parliaments, committee of regions) and one chamber representing solidarity: the European Parliament. The two chambers should have equivalent powers, as codecision should be applied to all decisions taken in the EU.
Parliament is boring The Greens' candidate admits he is often bored during the plenary session of the Parliament: "it is ridiculous, every parliamentarian comes to read his paper, better make a written declaration instead. I want to change the system: have statements by the rapporteur and by the political groups, but then leave the floor open for parliamentarians to debate. I want a confrontation of ideas, true political debates. All technical questions should be dealt with back in the Committees, not in Plenary."
Mr Onesta is confident it was not difficult to change the working of the parliament: "it is nowhere written in the Treaties that the Parliament should be boring. We need 314 votes to change the rules of procedure of the Parliament in order to make it more lively." he said. "This parliament will become what we dare doing with it."
Federalist with regionalist sensitivity Gérard Onesta entered the European Parliament in 1991. Since 1999, he is the youngest member of the Bureau of the European Parliament, in his quality as vice-president. He defines himself as a federalist with strong regionalist sensitivity and is a member of environmentalist and third world NGOs. He is single, a globe trotter, and enjoys particularly playing electrical guitar. Mr Onesta studied architecture and worked as an architect between 1984 and 1999. He appreciates loyalty, creativity and humour, even in politics.
Written by Daniela Spinant Edited by Blake Evans-Pritchard
Printet from www.EUobserver.com 11.01.2002 Copyright EUobserver. The informations may be used for personal and non-commercial use only. This article can be found on: www.EUobserver.com/index.phtml?action=view&selected_topic=none&article _id=4771