Capitals (agencies)
The European Parliament elections began yesterday, with the Netherlands being the first country to vote in a ballot that could see up to 360 million people in the Union’s 27 member states casting their votes over 4 days to choose 720 representatives, with expectations of the rise of the “far-right” despite… His divisions.
Voters in the Netherlands began casting their votes yesterday morning, in marathon elections that end next Sunday, the day on which the most prominent voters will be residents of Germany and France, the two largest economic powers in the bloc.
Opinion polls indicated that the right-wing “For Freedom” party, led by Geert Wilders, could win 18 of the 31 seats allocated to its country in the European Parliament.
This would double the party’s victory in the general elections next November.
Wilders had abandoned his pledge to organize a binding referendum on the Netherlands’ exit from the European Union, but his program remains deeply skeptical about the viability of European institutions.
“We want less immigration, we want tougher asylum laws and policies, we want to be responsible again for our choices,” Wilders said as he left the town hall in The Hague, where he cast his vote.
On the ninth of this month, more than 6 million Austrian voters will go to the polls to choose their representatives in the European Parliament, amid great fears of the rising popularity of the right-wing Liberal Party.
The opposition Liberal Party, led by its leader Herbert Kickl, seeks to take advantage of the popular resentment against the government parties to spread its racist ideas and to call for “the nations of Europe,” which differ from an integrated Europe, meaning that the laws and interests of each nation in the European Union have priority over the European Union, in contravention of the idea of “fusion.” In the European Union.
The phenomenon of illegal immigration occupies a priority on this party’s agenda, in addition to the high cost of living and inflation in the prices of basic consumer goods. According to a survey by the European Statistical Institute, “Europa Rometer”, right-wing parties will win between 20 and 30 percent of the seats in the European Parliament in the elections.
According to the institute, the participation rate in the elections is expected to decline to 50 percent after reaching 72 percent in 1995, that is, when Austria joined the European Union.
One of the factors that significantly influenced the opinions and positions of Austrians is the double standards followed by European Union leaders regarding humanitarian issues. Austria’s participation in the European elections is particularly symbolic, as it will be the seventh participation of its kind since Austria joined the European Union in January 1995.
Austria is currently represented in the European Parliament by 19 deputies, distributed as follows: the ruling conservative People’s Party (7 deputies), the opposition Socialist Party (5 deputies), the Green Party allied in government with the People’s Party (3 deputies), the far-right Liberal Party (3 deputies), and the Liberal Party. New (one deputy).
The number of Austrian representatives in the European Parliament is expected to rise to 20 in the current elections, and the Austrian Communist Party will enter the electoral battle for the first time and may win one seat, which it is expected to take away from the neoliberals. As for the movement that defends the idea of a unified Europe and adheres to European values, it has focused essentially in its campaigns on warning Austrians of the consequences of voting for the extreme right, as it represents, as they say, a threat to democratic values.
Once the results are in and the new parliament begins to take shape, EU leaders will meet for an informal summit to begin the process of selecting the new president of the European Commission, the EU’s most powerful executive position. The current Commission President, Ursula von der Leyen, is seeking to win a second term. To secure the presidency, she must obtain the support of a qualified majority of European Union leaders, and the European Parliament must approve her nomination by a majority of votes.
In 2019, von der Leyen was approved by a margin of just 9 votes. With the expected growth of right-wing parties in parliament, she may face a tougher challenge this time to remain in office.
One of the first tasks of the new parliament, whose directions will be revealed on Sunday evening, will be to confirm or reject the choices for senior positions in the European Union, that is, the heads of institutions in the bloc whose 27 leaders will try to agree on them at the summit scheduled to be held at the end of June in Brussels.
According to opinion polls, the European People’s Party is expected to remain the first political force, followed by the Progressive Alliance of Socialists and Democrats. The bet lies in knowing who will reach the third position currently occupied by the “Renew” or “Renew Europe” bloc (which includes the Ennahda Party led by Emmanuel Macron) in light of its decline and threat from the rise of two extreme right-wing blocs.
The number of deputies in the European Parliament currently stands at 705 deputies, distributed proportionally according to the population of the member states. Therefore, the most populous countries are represented by the largest number of deputies, such as Germany (96 deputies), France (79 deputies), Italy (76), Spain (59), and Poland (52), while the countries Small countries, such as Malta, Luxembourg, and Cyprus, are represented by 6 representatives, or one percent of the total number of parliamentarians, while Estonia has 7 representatives, and Slovenia has 8 representatives.
After the Netherlands, Ireland heads to vote today, Friday, followed by Latvia, Malta, and Slovakia tomorrow, Saturday. The Czech Republic and Italy vote over two days, June 7-8 and June 8-9, respectively. In the rest of the European Union countries, elections will be held next Sunday. Once the votes are counted and politicians are elected to their seats in the European Parliament, the political parties will form different European groups.
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