The explosion of “Qatargate” spread all weekend at breakneck speed, under the leadership of the examining magistrate Michel Claise, who has been investigating the corruption scandal continuously since Friday. The effects are devastating for the European Parliament, whose integrity is called into question by the aggressive lobbying of the emirate organizing the World Cup.
The “credibility of Europe” at stake
This Tuesday, December 13, the institution meeting in plenary should officially dismiss Vice-President Eva Kaili, in whose home several hundred thousand euros were found following a search. The elected Greek, imprisoned after this flagrante delicto, could not benefit from her parliamentary immunity, pending a court decision which could lead to her exclusion as an MEP.
In Greece, sanctions have already fallen on the 44-year-old former TV presenter. Eva Kaili was ousted from the Greek socialist party Pasok-Kinal, and the chairman of the Anti-Money Laundering Authority, Haralambos Vourliotis, announced that he had frozen “bank accounts, safes, companies and any other financial assets” of the chosen one.
Belgian justice is following its course. Carefully, the prosecution does not name Qatar directly, but “a Gulf country”. The investigating judge suspects the “payment of large sums of money or the offering of significant gifts to third parties having a political and/or strategic position enabling them to influence decisions within the European Parliament”.
Facts which, without waiting for judgment, cut into the “trust in the people at the heart of our institutions”, admitted Monday, December 12 the President of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen before a parliamentary session very disturbed by the affair. “The credibility of Europe is also and above all at stake”, declared, disappointed, the head of European diplomacy Josep Borrell, on his arrival for a meeting of foreign ministers in Brussels.
Exemplary question
Behind Eva Kaili, a whole network of compromise, partly made up of relatives. His companion, Francesco Giorgi, a parliamentary assistant from the Socialist Group (S & D), is one of the six people arrested. As well as the father of the MEP, released, apprehended in possession of a bag of tickets which he was the carrier. Among the accused is also the former socialist MEP Pier Antonio Panzeri (2004 to 2019), president of the NGO Fight Impunity which fights for human rights, and the general secretary of the International Trade Union Confederation, Luca Visentini.
The MEP Sylvie Guillaume does not take off, in front of the field of ruins. With her Polish colleague Danuta Hübner (EPP, right), this elected official spent a year, during the last mandate, working to set up a register of transparency which lists the meetings of lobbyists. For Sylvie Guillaume, it is an entire institution, known for holding the most maximalist positions in terms of moralizing public life and on fundamental rights, which is down.
“How do you explain to Bulgaria that it cannot enter Schengen because it cannot guarantee the integrity of its border? And in Hungary, Prime Minister Viktor Orban will laugh like a hunchback, as the EU prepares to rule on the mechanism for suspending European funds for non-compliance with anti-corruption standards. I’m sick of thinking that maybe he’ll get away with it again, because of this case. »
In Brussels, nearly 13,000 lobbies
In Brussels, a city often described as the “capital of lobbyists”, the European institutions are constantly subject to the influence of pressure groups. Currently, 12,800 organizations are registered in the Belgian capital, from TotalEnergies to Greenpeace. Cases of conflict of interest, of suspicious copy-pasting in parliamentary work, of dubious revolving doors after the exercise of a mandate, are legion in Parliament as in the Commission. They have generated their share of safeguards. For example, MEPs must present a declaration of financial interests. But never had such a gross case of corruption erupted in the European hemicycle.
The Belgian Philippe Lamberts, co-president of the Greens in the European Parliament, admits having “tick”, on November 24, when “the socialist group has become a great defender of Qatar” under the leadership of Eva Kaili. S&D had rejected a parliamentary motion on the state of human rights in the Gulf country ahead of the FIFA World Cup. The Greek elected representative then qualified Qatar as “precursor in labor law”.
On December 1, Eva Kaili was invited as a substitute in the Committee on Civil Liberties, Justice and Home Affairs (LIBE) of the European Parliament to ensure the necessary approval in order to obtain the visa exemption for citizens of Qatar in the “Schengen” area. In the end, Qatar will probably not win. In response to the scandal, the Greens and the Social Democrats have already announced that they will not vote for the start of negotiations to liberalize visas.
Avenues for reform
Ursula von der Leyen reaffirmed her proposal to create “an independent authority” on ethical issues in EU institutions. In this new standard to be built, MEPs are taking a close interest in the High Authority for the transparency of public life established in France in 2013 in response to the scandal triggered by the Cahuzac affair. “We would undoubtedly benefit from generalizing this system which peels the accounts of elected officials to determine if there has been fraudulent enrichment during a mandate”, defends Sylvie Guillaume.
Philippe Lamberts proposes that the transparency register limited to an official list of lobbyists could be “extended to diplomatic meetings” organized by third States. This would undoubtedly have been useful to raise several issues in the agenda of an Eva Kaili regularly invited to speak at the Rhodes forum, an event with a pro-Russian tendency organized by the oligarch Vladimir Yakunin, the ex-king Russian Railways. Eva Kaili also went to Qatar at the beginning of November, welcoming the positive results of the Qatari Minister of Labor, with the approval of the EU Ambassador in Doha, Cristian Tudor.
Raphaël Glucksmann, who chairs the special commission against foreign interference, sees in a new light his own functions hitherto concentrated on influence maneuvers by Russia or China. “I constantly warn that corruption and the penetration of foreign interests affect all European countries and all political parties. right and left, warns the Social Democratic MEP who advocates a reinforcement of his investigative power. But Philippe Lamberts warns: “All these controls will never be able to prevent a suitcase of tickets. »
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The European Parliament in figures
The European Parliament represents the approximately 450 million of European citizens across the 27 EU Member States.
It is the only European institution whose members are directly elected by universal suffrage every five years. The next European elections will take place in 2024.
It has legislative powersbudgetary and political control.
Since 18 January 2022, the European Parliament has been chaired by the Maltese Roberta Metsola, assisted by 14 vice-presidents.
It is made up of 705 deputies gathered in 7 political groupsgoing from far left to far right.
The monthly remuneration of MEPs is €7,316.63 after deduction of European tax and social contributions. It is subject to national tax in several Member States, and therefore varies according to the tax regime in force in each country of choice.