Ansip assisted by hundreds

Photo: SCANPIX

Last night, MEPs interrogated Andrus Ansip – candidate for single digital market vice Ansip assisted by hundreds.

For people aspiring into European Commission, hearings before European Parliament committee(s) mean tons of thorough preparations – meetings and reading, training and the choice of «competition tactics».

The so-called transition team for Andrus Ansip (58) featured five full-time employees, assisted by about 15 from the commission’s general secretariat. Officials at directorates – hundreds of them – were busy preparing analyses for the new commissioner even before they knew who it would be.

During the couple of weeks leading up to the hearing, Mr Ansip met the factions and committees – some unofficially. Also, he organised a round-table for the heads of general directorates to be under him as VP.

With his team, Mr Ansip practiced answering to questions probably to be asked of him. Training the various versions was prerequisite for the hearing to go smooth and fluent, and that the candidate come across as competent and trustworthy. Indeed, the 3-hour hearing was nothing like such procedures in the US Congress, say – rather, it resembled an academic lecture at a university. Essentially, however, this was a public job interview before hundreds of pairs of eyes.

Vital herein the tactical choices. Like, for instance, the language to speak in. They do interpret every speech into all the official tongues at the European Parliament – Estonian included. Still, by the two-term commission veteran Siim Kallas, Mr Ansip was advised to listen to the translation into English and answer in the selfsame language. That, said Mr Kallas, would be faster, and there’d be no confusion switching from one tongue to another – easier to stick to the topic and relevant terminology.

Among the MEPs, the right to pose questions at official hearings is a rare and precious commodity. «Even with no pressing interest towards the topic and the answers, this is a way to get shown in TV,» was one somewhat cynical explanation.

At every faction, roles are divided for the hearings – who asks who – and, occasionally, the content of a question gets coordinated as well.

Tunne Kelam, in his thirst MEP term running, said the unofficial hearings are much more interesting for parliament members that the main ones. The unofficial means meetings between factions, committees or their leaders with candidates. At such get-togethers, MEPs get a chance to forward their messages to candidates, and raise issues.

After the official hearing, the committee in question (or committees) need to issue their verdict on the candidate within 24 hours – by tonight we will know what they thought of Mr Ansip and his presentation.

Estonia’s representatives in European Parliament – Tunne Kelam, Yana Toom and Kaja Kallas – thought there’d be no resistance to Mr Ansip.  According to Kaja Kallas, there are the candidates regarding whom lots of negative materials have been sent to the European parliament, and then the MEPs are naturally prejudiced as they enter the hearing. No letters of complaint sent over Mr Ansip, said Ms Kallas.

The journalist’s travel costs were covered by European Parliament.