The Parliamentary Committees for Foreign Policy and European Affairs gave a favorable opinion on Tuesday, with 35 votes in favor and six against, granting Parliament's confidence to Roxana Minzatu, Romania's nominee for European Commissioner.

"It was an extremely professional hearing. (...) It was an extremely professional development, with professional answers and a consolidated European vision and the result is not a surprise. I would like to congratulate her, together with my fellow chairs of the other three committees, Roxana Minzatu for the favorable opinion obtained with an extremely solid, overwhelming majority of 35 votes in favor, six votes against, for obtaining the opinion and the confidence of the Romanian Parliament, before the hearing that will take place at the European Parliament in just one week," said Social Democrat Titus Corlatean, Chairman of the Foreign Policy Committee in the Romanian Senate.

Roxana Minzatu, who will hold the People, Skills and Preparedness and a post of executive vice-president of the European Commission, emphasized, after the hearings, that Romania is for the first time in the the European Commission's leadership.

"I presented the priorities of the portfolio both as Executive Vice President of the European Commission and we have to tell Romanians that for the first time Romania is in the leadership of the European Commission. There are seven people in this top echelon: President Ursula von der Leyen and six other Vice-Presidents, including the High Representative for Foreign Policy. I represent not only Romania, but also the countries that joined after 2004, after 2007, Eastern Europe, and I think it is important to recognize that we have this role at Commission level. It is a very important portfolio, in which I directly coordinate funds of over EUR 240 billion. We are talking about the European Social Fund Plus, the Social Climate Fund, Erasmus+, money which is already going into Romanians' pockets today, the RON 250 vouchers for Romanians, which come every two months for Romanians affected by poverty. They are an example of what we are financing within this portfolio," MInzatu explained.

She specified that she presented the pieces of legislation that she is directly coordinating, such as the Labour Code and the labor law that transposes the acquis communautaire in Romania.

"We talked about education and skills, about how we are going to support Europeans who are increasingly affected by poverty and there are Europeans who have a job and, despite having a job, cannot afford rent or access to quality housing. I gave examples of interventions that we are considering, both on legislation and funding programmes. We also talked about other important policies for Romania, such as the cohesion policy," added Roxana Minzatu.

She maintained that she will be involved in the European Commission in all decisions that will be made.

"I will be a voice in the College of Commissioners. I will generally make decisions there by consensus, by simple majority anyway, but I will be involved in all the policies and decisions that will be made in the Commission, which are relevant, obviously, at the European level, but also for Romanians," Minzatu added.

The hearings in the specialised committees were held in the absence of PNL MPs, who left the meeting, the leader of the Liberal MEPs, Gabriel Andronache, adding that the party was not consulted in the procedure of appointing the European Commissioner on behalf of Romania. AGERPRES (RO - author: Alina Novaceanu, editor: Claudia Stanescu; EN - editor: Simona Iacob)