EU must end 'tradition of secrecy'

By Shada Islam

BRUSSELS (DPA): Independent experts investigating allegations of fraud and mismanagement in the European Union's executive Commission last Friday denounced the agency's "tradition of secretiveness" and said EU officials must come under more stringent parliamentary control.

The experts, whose earlier report into Commission conduct led to the unprecedented en-masse resignation of the EU executive headed by Jacques Santer in March this year, said openness and accountability must be the cornerstones of all EU institutions.

"Openness is not in the first place a question of codes of conduct, but a question of mentalities and attitudes, arising from the basic principle that the public has a right to know how public institutions use the power and resources entrusted to them," the experts said.

The five-member team of independent lawyers was called in by the European Parliament earlier this year to look into charges of misconduct and fraud in the EU Commission.

Their first report issued in March blasted a number of European Commissioners -- including France's Edith Cresson -- for cronyism, negligence and failure to take political responsibility for actions committed by officials under their authority.

The hard-hitting report triggered an unexpected institutional crisis in the 15-nation bloc, forcing out the team of Jacques Santer and leading to the appointment of former Italian Prime Minister Romano Prodi as the Commission's new chief.

Prodi, who expected to be confirmed by a vote in the European Parliament next week, has promised to launch a new era of reform and change in the EU executive.

But his task will not be easy. The second report by the so- called "wise men", taking a more detailed look at the Commission's administrative culture, says that the multi-cultural character of EU institutions is one of the elements which "potentially give rise to a culture of moral fluxicility and permissiveness".

Instead of working in the wider European interest, officials often demonstrate "unhealthy national allegiances" which cut across the formal structures of the Commission, the report says.

Experts caution that while conducting their inquiry, they frequently encountered the existence of "national reflexes and even of national networks within the Commission".

Unveiling further cobwebs for Prodi to sweep out, the experts warned that top civil servants in the agency, appointed under an informal system of national "quotas", had created national "fiefdoms" which could ultimately undermine the very idea of European integration.

In a desperate 11th hour attempt to jack up public confidence, the Santer Commission did adopt a code of conduct laying down stringent rules for the behavior of European Commissioners, both inside and outside the office.

However, the controversial decision by former Industry Commissioner Martin Bangemann to accept a job with Spanish telecommunication giant Telefonica despite allegations of conflict of interest made a mockery of the code.

The wise men's report now urges incoming Commission chief Romano Prodi to adopt a tougher code for Commissioners and to also forge strict new rules for the conduct of other officials.

Prodi must create "legislative and institutional arrangements that reinforce ethical behavior and create sanctions against wrongdoing", the document said.

"In the first instance, it falls to the new Commission, and above all its president, to give an example by their own behavior of a move away from the present mentality of secretiveness to one of openness," the investigators stressed.

In a clear reference to Paul van Buitenen, a Commission official who blew the whistle on cases of fraud in the agency and was suspended by Santer's team for breach of EU rules on confidentiality, the report said people with a conscience should be encouraged to expose wrongdoings, not punished for going public with their concerns.

"Instead of offering ethical guidance, the hierarchy put additional pressure upon one such official," the experts complained.

The focus will now be on Prodi to undertake the radical overhaul of the Commission that he has been promising over the last few months.

The incoming EU chief has already agreed to cooperate more closely with the European Parliament and to fire any Commissioner whose conduct is deemed unacceptable.

Change, however, is expected to come slowly. The 17,000-strong EU bureaucracy has grown accustomed to its privileges and traditions.

Even Prodi, credited with streamlining the Italian administration, recognizes that reforming EU institutions will take years and years of blood, sweat and tears.