French President Emmanuel Macron is at the centre of the dispute after he criticised Spitzenkandidat – the EU’s obtuse and ‘undemocratic’ process for choosing who will replace outgoing European Commission President Jean Claude-Junker. Mr Macron said his country does not feel obliged to follow the system which sees the European Council choose the nominee of the party winning the most seats in Parliament.
Speaking after the summit in Romania’s Sibiu, he said: “I don’t feel bound at all by the principle of the Spitzenkandidat.”
The French leader added he has “has respect” for European People’s Party (EPP) candidate Manfred Weber.
He was backed by Luxembourg’s prime minister Xavier Bettel, who said the process was a “mistake from the beginning”.
Mr Bettel added: “Ask my voters – they have no clue who’s the Spitzenkandidat.”
The Spitzenkandidat process is not written in EU treaties and requires agreement among the European Council, European Parliament and main European political parties.
The process awards the Commission presidency to the party which wins the most seats in Parliament.
The system has also received criticism from Hungary, Lithuania, the Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Czech Republic and Slovakia.
Lithuania’s president Dalia Gyrbauskaite: “I think it is a little bit out of democratic procedures and treaties.”
But President of the European Council Donald Tusk defended the system saying: “This is the key, in fact, no automaticity – but goodwill.
“We have to respect the fact that we have Spitzenkandidaten because this is a real political fact.
“In fact, I have in my notebook that the only public announced candidacies are Spitzenkandidaten.
“But of course it is not any kind of automaticity or formal or legal obligation and as we know we have some skeptics.”
He said he wanted to have the distribution of the bloc’s top jobs decided by June.
Mr Tusk added: “My intention is for the Council to nominate the new EU leadership in June.
“I call on everyone to live up to their responsibility to make this possible.”
Austrian Prime Minister Sebastian Kurz has also defended the system, saying “I do not see this as democratic”.
But in an attempt to put on a united front, the leader’ summit statement declared: “We reaffirm our belief that united, we are stronger in this increasingly unsettled and challenging world.”