European Ombudsman Emily O’Reilly has criticized the European Commission’s lack of transparency about text messages between European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and Pfizer’s CEO Albert Bourla. The messages between the two were about the purchase of vaccines against COVID-19 and date from last year.
That von der Leyen and Bourla exchanged text messages during negotiations on the purchase of vaccines, was already apparent from an article in ‘The New York Times‘ from April 2021.
A journalist then asked the Commission for access to these text messages and other documents about the talks. He agreed to forward three documents (an e-mail, a letter and a press release) to him, but there was no text message traffic.
This was explained by the fact that the Commission did not register these messages. Text messages are not intended to be stored and are not subject to the 2001 transparency rules of the European institutions, the institution says.
However, Ombudsman O’Reilly disagrees. She has asked von der Leyen’s office to conduct “further investigations” to track down the messages and reveal their contents, in accordance with transparency rules applicable to EU documents.
For O’Reilly “it is clear” that texting “comes within the framework of European law on public access to documents” and “the public can access them if they relate to the work of the institution “. She called on the European government to change its document retention practices to take into account “modern means of communication”.
“No attempt has been made to determine whether the text messages in question existed. This course of action does not meet expectations in terms of transparency,” the Ombudsman criticized.
The Commission said in a response that these messages “are by their nature short-lived documents, which in principle do not contain important information related to the Commission’s policies, activities and decisions”.
European MP Van Brempt: “Unacceptable”
“The fact that the Commission refuses to disclose the content of those contacts is unacceptable,” said European MP Kathleen Van Brempt (Vooruit) in a response.
Van Brempt calls the Commission’s argument that text messages are not subject to the transparency rules “nonsense”. “During the same period, the Commission signed a €1.8 billion contract with Pfizer to purchase vaccines against COVID-19. Then any contact between the Commission’s top woman and the boss of a major producer of COVID-19 vaccines is relevant. Whether it concerns e-mails, physical meetings or texting.”
Van Brempt believes it is essential that parliament has all the necessary information with a view to the special committee that will evaluate the approach to the pandemic in Europe. “We know that personal diplomacy between the European Commission and the pharmaceutical industry has played an important role in purchasing the vaccines. It is highly questionable what further influence Bourla has exerted on the Commission in the further approach to the pandemic,” adds the MEP.
“It is an open secret that behind the scenes Pfizer is exerting heavy pressure on the European Commission not to make concessions to developing countries about the patents in the World Trade Organization. We need to know what von der Leyen promised Bourla,” said Van Brempt.
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