EUROPEAN DIARY:Three months into the job, the European Council president has some way to go before asserting his personality and will on the EU stage
GASPS RANG around the European Parliament as British Eurosceptic MEP Nigel Farage launched a vindictive tirade against Herman Van Rompuy, president of the European Council.
Farage claimed Van Rompuy, a man more likely to turn away from television cameras than towards them, had the charisma of a “damp rag”. Clearly discomfited, Van Rompuy said he held the insult in contempt.
It was schoolyard stuff from Farage and it said more about his penchant for provocative bombast than anything else.
But it is clear that Van Rompuy, now three months into the job, has some way to go before asserting his personality and will on the European stage.
Plucked from the relative obscurity of his position as Belgian prime minister, he now occupies a post that was specifically created to give impetus to the EU’s renewal under the Lisbon reform treaty.
That he is a man of intellectual substance is not in doubt. But at a time of great challenge and change, he has yet to establish himself as a kinetic political force.
Still, Van Rompuy has been busy behind the scenes. His allies say it was he who ultimately forged the deal last month to bail out Greece if a rescue package is needed to avert the prospect of a sovereign default within the union – as seems increasingly likely.
It was in his office, they say, that German chancellor Angela Merkel and French president Nicolas Sarkozy finally reached an accommodation as to the nature of the public guarantee that Greece would receive. Also present was European Central Bank president Jean-Claude Trichet and Greek prime minister George Papandreou.
Whereas bilateral aid for Greece had been under discussion for days, close associates of Van Rompuy say it was he who insisted on an EU dimension to the commitment to Athens from all EU leaders.
Van Rompuy unveiled the deal in a statement to the press. Standing quietly beside him was a man not given to silence, European Commission president José Manuel Barroso. It was an apt illustration of the change afoot since the Lisbon pact was enacted.
There was change, too, in the setting of the special economic summit at which the deal was signed off. Van Rompuy’s decision to bring EU leaders to a 19th-century library on the fringe of the EU quarter in Brussels was rooted in his belief that an intimate setting would improve the debate. Contrary to tradition, this meant EU ambassadors were excluded from the gathering. Certain members of the diplomatic corps were not impressed.
In some quarters, there was also a measure of displeasure when Van Rompuy sent a letter to EU leaders reflecting on the summit. The gathering was “unofficial” so the leaders did not themselves adopt conclusions from their talks.
Opinion is divided as to Van Rompuy’s circulation of his own unofficial conclusions, as per his letter, and some of the views he expressed therein.
All of this is taking place against the backdrop of significant institutional change. After all, Van Rompuy and his team are seeking to forge new ground for a permanent position, which replaces an office long held on a six-month rotating basis by the leaders of the union’s member states.
It is plain to see that his great advantages will be time, continuity and the absence of the distractions that inevitably come with national office.
By necessity, however, Van Rompuy’s job is also a public one. Yet he has been all but invisible for the most part, restricting his public outings to photo-calls with visiting leaders and the occasional speech.
Farage’s attack last Wednesday came after Van Rompuy’s first address to MEPs since his appointment. The following night he addressed the European College in Bruges.
As befits Van Rompuy’s office and his temperament, the speeches are deeply serious. The typical text reiterates his fear that global economic forces threaten the viability of the European way of life, or social model. At the same time, he dismisses talk of European decline in the face China’s rise and US might.
These are key concerns, certainly. In the modern age, however, trying to influence the international political agenda without developing a more public profile seems unwise. Is it not all the more important to do so when seeking to establish the parameters of a crucial institutional post that will be around for decades?
Consider too that Van Rompuy was chosen alongside a new foreign affairs chief for the union, Catherine Ashton, who shares his aversion to publicity. "I'm not interested in the limelight. I'm interested in what we can actually do," she told Timemagazine.
Van Rompuy might say the same.
It is of course arguable that both were hand-picked by EU leaders for exactly for this reason.
It still early days, but in a union that bemoans its lack of clout in the world, Lisbon was framed as something other than an organisational revamp. As the transition to new structures continues, it looks at present like no more than that.
