German socialist Martin Schulz elected President of the European Parliament
The European Parliament elected German socialist Martin Schulz as its new President on January 17 2012.
Schulz (56) got 387 votes out of 699 votes cast, defeating UK conservative MEP Nirj Deva, who got 142 votes, and British liberal MEP Dianna Wallis, who got 141.
Schulz will be European Parliament President until the next MEP elections in June 2014.
In his acceptance speech, Schulz said that in these times of crisis "our interests can no longer be separated from those of our neighbours. Either we all lose, or we all win".
Schulz was born on December 20 1955 in Hehlrath - a small German city close to the German-Dutch-Belgian border. After high school he apprenticed as a bookseller and opened his own store in Würselen in 1982, which he ran for 12 years.
He began his political career at 19, joining the German Social Democratic Party.
At 31 he became the youngest mayor of Germany’s most populous Land, North Rhine-Westphalia, when he was elected mayor of Würselen, a post he held for 11 years.
"This time shaped my enthusiasm for Europe and the conviction that I wanted to help build and advance the European project," he says of his time as a local politician, as quoted on the website of the European Parliament.
Elected to the EP in 1994, Schulz has served on a number of committees, including the sub-committee on human rights and the civil liberties committee.
He led the German delegation of the Socialist group (SPD members) from 2000 and was also a vice-chair of the Socialist Group in the EP.
He was elected group leader in 2004, a position held until he was elected EP president. Since 2009, Schulz has also acted as representative for European Affairs for Germany’s SPD party and his views have deeply influenced his party’s pro-European politics.
Schulz replaces the outgoing President Jerzy Buzek (EPP, Poland).
Schulz told the European Parliament: "We must grasp the fact that people in Europe have little time for institutional debates because they are too busy worrying about their future, their jobs, their pensions (...). This Chamber is the place where the interests of the people are defended".
He said that "for the first time since it was founded, the failure of the European Union is a realistic possibility" adding that, "our interests can no longer be separated from those of our neighbours; on a shared understanding that the EU is not a zero-sum game, in which one person must lose so that another can win. The reverse is true: either we all lose – or we all win. The fundamental basis for this is the Community method. It is not a technocratic concept, but the principle at the heart of everything the European Union stands for!".
Over the past two years summits of the EU heads of state and government, meant "the representatives of the peoples of Europe have essentially been reduced to the role of rubberstamping agreements reached between governments in backrooms in Brussels: the European Parliament will not stand idly by and watch this process continue," Schulz said, adding that "the intergovernmental agreement on a new fiscal union will be the first test".
"Whoever breaches the values enshrined in our Charter of Fundamental Rights must reckon with us as adversaries. That is our duty as Members of the European Parliament".
Text and photo: www.sofiaecho.com
To see the presentation of the company, please follow the link:
Presentation of Mirela Real Estate