Portuguese EU Commissioner’s pick comes clean regarding business interests

European commissioner-designate for Portugal, Maria Luís Albuquerque, has clarified her work for fund manager Horizon and her company ownership with her husband in her declaration of interests after being questioned by MEPs.

The information is contained in Albuquerque's response to a letter from the European Parliament's Committee on Legal Affairs, to which Lusa had access on Wednesday.

In her response, the former finance minister and nominee for the Financial Services and Savings and Investments Union portfolio insists that she has no "financial interests" that could be declared or give rise to a conflict of interest and that neither she nor her immediate family own "any bonds, shares or other assets or liabilities", apart from a home or inherited buildings.

In the letter, which has now been sent to MEPs, she clarifies her work with Portuguese fund manager Horizon Equity Partners and her ownership of a company through which she provided services with her husband.

The statement indicates that between 28 December 2023 and 29 August 2024,  Albuquerque, as part of her work for Horizon, was a member of the board of directors of a company, HRRL Açores, created to manage the shares in Euroscut Azores.

"I left my post when I was announced as Portugal's nominee for the College of Commissioners," she says in the document to which Lusa has had access.

“The second clarification emphasises that the company through which I carried out the tasks mentioned above is owned by me and my husband", she said, adding that this company "is being closed down" because it no longer carries out these tasks.

The clarifications come after the European Parliament's legal affairs committee asked for more information earlier this month, in line with the code of conduct for members of the future College of Commissioners.

The European Parliament will decide whether or not to approve the name of Albuquerque and the rest of the college proposed and led by Ursula von der Leyen, who will serve a new five-year term as the head of the European Commission.

In mid-September, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen proposed the Financial Services and the Savings and Investment Union portfolio to Portugal's commissioner nominee.

At the time, von der Leyen said the portfolio was "vital to complete the Capital Markets Union and to ensure that private investment boosts European productivity and innovation".

Von der Leyen stressed that the former Portuguese minister "will be excellent in this role because she has enormous experience as a finance minister, but also enormous experience in the private sector", having worked for financial institutions such as Morgan Stanley and Arrow Global.

This was made clear in her mission letter, in which the president of the European Commission asked the Portuguese commissioner-designate to use her experience to "unlock a substantial amount of investment" for the European Union.

The 57-year-old former Portuguese minister is one of 11 women out of 27 names (a quota of 40% for women and 60% for men) in von der Leyen's proposed team of new commissioners still to be grilled by MEPs.

(Ana Matos Neves – edited by Pedro Sousa Carvalho | Lusa.pt)