Euro Elections 2009: Jerzy Buzek Is Voted In As The EU's New President

The EU parliament has voted in the 69 year old ex-Prime Minister of Poland, Jerzy Buzek, as it's next president. The conservative politician will hold the position for two and a half years, instead of the normal five years, due to a power-sharing deal between the right and left which sees a socialist being voted in when his time is up. This is the first Eastern Bloc president of the EU, so in this way it is a big move, but he is also from a very prominent Polish political family, and he has spent his entire life in these circles, so he is most certainly one of the lads already. This comfortable deal between the centre-right and centre-left MEP's saw him take 555 votes out of a possibly 736.

July.16.2009 - George Valentine Corr, Blatant News Editor
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JERZY BUZEK
Jerzy Buzek was born on the 3rd of July 1940 close to the Polish border, in what is now the Czech Republic. At this time it was annexed by the Nazi's, and after the war his family moved to Chorzów in Southern Poland. He graduated from university in his early 20's, having studied chemical engineering, and began working at the Chemical Engineering Institute of the Polish Academy of Sciences in Gliwicein. He is currently a professor of technical science, a post he has held since 1997, mixing it with his political work and teaching. He is from a well-known Polish family, the Buzek's, who were big players in Poland between the first world war and the second. During the time when the communist's had control of Poland he was a leader in the anti-communist movement, most notably as the Chairman of the Solidarity trade union whenever they were allowed to be part of the political process by the communist rulers.

ELECTED!
He was a prominent member of the RS AWS political movement (the Solidarity Electoral Action of the Right) which was a coalition of 30+ liberal, christian democrat and conservative parties formed in 1996. The US Republican Party credits itself with bringing that coalition together, and Jerzy Buzek co-wrote it's economic program, which was used to reform Poland in the late 90's. He was elected to the lower parliament in 1997, and was given the Prime Minister's post straight away as part of a coalition between the AWS and other centre-right parties. He remained Prime Minister until 2001 when his party was defeated and he resigned as chairman to take a back seat in politics. When he was then elected as an MEP in 2004, a lot of people saw this as a retirement position for him, so it is a bit of a shock to see him as the new top-dog, after being elected the head of the EU parliament.

ANOTHER ONE OFF THE PRODUCTION LINE?
It's hard to know what to expect from Mr Buzek. When researching through his history it looks like a mixture of science, trade union work and law reform. But his right-wing & economic views seem to contradict his trade union background, and the more you look, the more you see that he is from the same club as the rest of our leaders. These sure are a tight-knit bunch, and spanning the globe too. We shall see if he does a good job on taking over from the previous EU parliament president, Hans-Gert Pöttering, a German christian democrat. Buzek has stated that 'human rights' will be a main focus for his time in power. I just hope it's not the very same 'human rights' his good friends in the Republican Party are noted for. The biggest thing to come out of this is the bridging of gaps between eastern and western Europe, and this alone is something positive to take from his election. But we must remain on the ball, because his new job may just be payback for past favours, and future ones too.

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