Mario de Queiroz and Miren Gutierrez* interview MARIO SOARES, former Portuguese President
LISBON, Jun 3 (IPS) – Global house prices are diving further, unemployment in the 16 countries using the euro increased in April to its highest level in almost ten years, and Eurozone Gross Domestic Product is expected to shrink by 1.9 percent during 2009…So what is Europe doing about it? Voters among the European Union’s 500 million people in 27 countries will be casting their ballots Jun. 4-7 to choose their representatives to the European Parliament for the next five years. The new Parliament will set the tone and pace of European policies in the face of the crisis.
Socialist Mario Soares thinks these elections are crucial, and that the socialists of Europe should put up a presidential candidate for the European Commission who can implement their anti-crisis plan.
Soares was the first Premier of democratic Portugal from 1976 to 1978, again from 1983 to 1985, and then President from 1986 to 1996. Even his critics admit that his main accomplishment was to turn public opinion around and to negotiate Portugal’s entry into the EU in 1986. Portugal at the time was suspicious of integration into the EU.
Soares wrote recently about the financial crisis and the position of the Socialists of Europe. He responded to IPS in line with some of his analysis.
IPS: What has been the difference of response to the financial crisis between the U.S. and Europe?
MARIO SOARES: The current global crisis is the worst since 1929, and will be a prolonged one. But some positive signals are now coming from the U.S., which is focussing its efforts on the real economy.
Barack Obama is saying that we only will overcome this crisis by taking measures that ordinary citizens understand because those measures meet their needs and aspirations, involving social and environmental changes, and also punishment of those who are guilty of greed.
In contrast, the European Union, governed by actors of the past – some of them close to former U.S. president George Bush — has not been able to agree on a coordinated plan to respond to this crisis. This was the final outcome of the London G20 Summit on Apr. 2. It seems most of the European leaders just want to change the minimum possible to keep things as they are.
The U.S. of Barack Obama has understood this, even though the U.S. has not yet emerged from the crisis. In contrast, the EU, divided, without an assertive leadership and lacking a clear path, is being marginalised, with negative repercussions for all European countries.
