European Commission President-elect Jean-Claude Juncker on Friday presented all candidates for his Commission, including Neven Mimica of Croatia.
After holding consultations with the candidates in recent days, Juncker on Friday sent a list with the new commissioners to the Council of the EU, which is expected to formally confirm it. Until the list is approved, Juncker will not go public with the allocation of the portfolios, the Slovenian STA news agency has reported.
This is expected to happen next week. Juncker’s spokeswoman Natasha Bertraud said the candidates were chosen based on their competencies and assessment of who fit best into Juncker’s team.
After the portfolios are allotted, the candidates are to be interviewed by the European Parliament committees. The European Parliament will vote on the new EC, including its president, between 20 and 23 October.
The term of the new EC starts on November 1.
Various unofficial versions of portfolio allocation have leaked to the media, and according to those documents, Mimica would be given an important sector, Regional Policy, from which EU funds are managed. However, the documents may be subject to change and there has been no confirmation of Mimica’s having been selected for the post.
The other members of Juncker’s team are: Federica Mogherini of Italy, Vytenis Andriukaitis of Lithuania, Andrus Annsip of Estonia, Miguel Arias Canete of Spain, Dimitris Avramopulos of Greece, Elzbieta Bienkowska of Poland, Corina Cretu of Romania, Valdis Dombrovskis of Latvia, Kristalina Georgieva of Bulgaria, Johannes Hahn of Austria, Jonathan Hill of Great Britain, Phil Hogan of Ireland, Vera Jourova of the Czech Republic, Jyrki Katainen of Finland, Cecilia Malmstroem of Sweden, Carlos Moedas of Portugal, Pierre Moscovici of France, Tibor Navracsics of Hungary, Guenther Oettinger of Germany, Maros Sefcovic of Slovakia, Hristos Stilianides of Cyprus, Marianne Thyssen of Belgium, Frans Timmermans of the Netherlands, Karmenu Vella of Malta and Margrethe Vestager of Denmark