EU chief Ursula von der Leyen exposed to text scandal in the Pfizer

Ursula von der Leyen, President of the European Commission and the unnecessed figurehead of the executive department of the European Union, has long since exchanged itself as a paragon of transparency. In the speech after the speech, she campaigned for openness in the government and presented the EU as a bulwark against the cloudy shops of autocratic regime. However, a recent decision by the European Court Court (EUJ) has set up a hard light on Leyen's own behavior that exposes a blatant contradiction between its rhetoric and its reality.

In the center of the scandal there are a number of text messages that are said to be exchanged between the Leyen and the CEO of Pfizer, Albert Bourla, during the height of the Covid 19 pandemic. According to reports, these messages played a key role in securing a colossal deal for 1.8 billion doses of Pfizer's Covid vaccine. The problem? When the Leyen's commission asked to create these texts, he essentially flinched his armpits and claimed that they were gone.

This is not just a question of the bad records-it is a question of democratic accountability. The EUJ has now decided that the Leyen and its commission did not provide a “plausible explanation” for the disappearance of the texts and acted inappropriately by treating them as irrelevant. The court confirmed the right of the New York Times to access these records, recognizing that the communication of this kind is subject to public examination in the public interest and the involvement of billions of taxpayers.

The Leyen's fall from her self -fashioned base is particularly impressive because she aggressively campaigned for transparency. In her speech of 2023 of the European Union, she warned of autocrats that eroded democratic institutions from the inside, and demanded an absolute openness. In 2019, she instructed all EU commissioners to “be more transparent” and promised that transparency would be a cornerstone of her administration.

But while their speeches stood strongly of moralist overtures, they now seem to be hardly more than theater. Behind closed doors, Leyen conducted informal negotiations with one of the most powerful pharmaceutical companies in the world by text and private telephone calls, whereby formal procurement protocols were surrounded and wider institutional checks are canceled.

These were not a trivial exchange. According to the New York Times, Leyen personally managed the “personal diplomacy”, which led to a mega representative with Pfizer. Their close relationship with Bourla and the resulting offer worth 71 billion euros for vaccines from Pfizer and Astrazeneca was praised as a diplomatic success at that time. But this narrative dissolves as details of or rather the lack of them to light.

The commission's apology for the not generation of text messages was as thin as Kühn. Essentially, it argued that the texts were too “short -lived” and “short -lived” in order to qualify as official documents, and therefore did not have to be archived or disclosed. This despite the fact that these messages were bound directly to one of the most important public procurement transactions in the history of the EU.

The EUJ didn't buy it. In his decision, it found that the Commission had not given a credible explanation for the disappearance of the news and had no right to one -sided to decide on its importance. The public institutions, emphasized the court, cannot only survive under a cloak with selective transparency.

The decision is not only for the credibility of the Leyens, but also for the entire approach of the European Commission on the government during pandemic. The news of the court is clear: the public accountability is not optional.

The failure of these secret business has already become obvious. The countries in Bergen sit in the entire EU in mountains that they no longer need or cannot use. According to reports, Germany alone has rejected around 200 million doses. Governments in Poland, Bulgaria, Hungary, Lithuania, Estonia, Slovakia and Czech Republic are now pressing Brussels to renegotiate the conditions of these business. However, new negotiations are difficult if even EU member states are kept in the dark about what has been agreed.

The European judicial court, who had passed the second highest legal authority of the EU last year, added the European judicial court that the Commission had illegally restricted public access to vaccine procurement contracts. The court found that there was no mandatory evidence that greater transparency had affected the commercial interests of the companies involved. In other words, the EU's secrecy protected sensitive business information Non-Non-protected her own actions from control.

This raises a terrifying question: How many other back room transactions could have been made under similar conditions?

It is not as if this is the first time that the Leyen participated in questionable shops. Her term as Germany's Defense Minister from 2013 to 2019 was plagued by scandals, which participated in the abuse of defense contracts. An investigation by the Atlantic Council from 2015 showed that some German soldiers were forced to proceed during the NATO exercises due to chronic lack of equipment instead of rifles during the NATO exercises, while the Leyen allegations were subjected to preference and budget management.

The Pfizer Affair fits a wider pattern: performative guidance paired with poor accountability and contempt for democratic supervision. It also reflects a dangerous concentration of power in the hands of a single figure that is technically approved by the European Parliament, but is not directly chosen by the citizens that concern it.

After the first judgment of the lower court, the commission's answer was of indifference. It was stated that within legal limits it offers “the greatest possible public access to documents”, and insisted that partial transparency was sufficient. But the EUJ has now destroyed this illusion. This is a legal and political moment that requires a serious course correction to whatever the judiciary, at least to maintain trust that remains in EU institutions.

So far there is hardly any signs that the Leyen intends to change the course. Your recalculation offer is still supported by a large part of the EU establishment, and there is little internal dynamic to fold it into account. But with this new judgment it is likely that the pressure will increase. Citizens, journalists and even some Member States now have judicial support to demand more clarity.

If transparency were a vaccine, the European Court of Justice from Leyen gave a lengthy booster. It remains to be seen whether it looks effective. The irony is blatant: the same woman who has been involved in a scandal because of her lack of openness that would have many of them blushed.

The EU now faces a moment of billing. If it continues to tolerate selective transparency at the top, there is a risk of undermining the very democratic values ​​that it claims to maintain. For von der Leyen, the street should not start with a different language in front of us, but with the publication of these text messages.

The public deserves to answer. And this time “ups, they are gone” just not.

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