The European Union has come under fire, following what it has described as a series of technical mistakes after the president of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen decided to publicly back the governing conservative party in Croatia’s parliamentary elections. This has been described as a breach of the EU’s political neutrality guidelines.
Ms von der Leyen appeared in a campaign video that was posted over the weekend by the Croatian Democratic Union (HDZ) ahead of Sunday’s parliamentary elections. Ms Von der Leyen was the former defence minister for the centre-right Christian Democratic Union (CDU) and belongs to the same grouping in the European parliament as the European People´s Party as the HDZ.
However, the code of conduct for members of the European Commission orders that members of the Commission “shall abstain from making public statements or interventions on behalf of any political party or organization of the social partners of which they are members”.
The chief spokesman for the commission Eric Mamer spoke at a press conference yesterday and said that Ms Von der Leyen was meant to be speaking in a personal capacity and is categorically refusing to apologise. Mr Mamer said: “Obviously this video should not have been recorded against the backdrop of the Berlaymont,” which is the office building of the commission in Brussels. However, he did also say “When it was recorded, they used the same backdrop they had used for the previous video recordings”.
The video received a bulk of criticism on social media. In the video Ms Von der Leyen was identified as the European Commission president and was filmed standing in front of a European flag. According to incomplete results received the HDZ has won the election. Over 90 per cent of the votes have now been counted and the HDZ has won 66 seats in Croatia´s 151-seat parliament and it is now likely that they will form a new coalition government.
Current Affairs Correspondent | My name is Oliver Down I am 22, and a staunch brexiteer. I am a Bristolian lad who studied politics in Leicester. I believe in free speech and accurate journalism and I won’t be afraid to give you “the other side” of the story!
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