By Christopher Condonin Budapest andTom Burgis in Brussels
José Manuel Barroso, European Commission president, last night approved Romania's second-choice candidate for a post on the Commission after Bucharest's initial nominee was forced to withdraw.
Mr Barroso backed Leonard Orban, an independent bureaucrat who helped negotiate Romania's treaty with the EU.
The nomination of Mr Orban, deputy minister for European integration, -follows the embarrassing withdrawal of Varujan Vosganian, Bucharest's first choice. Mr Vosganian, a prominent senator, was accused of having close ties with corrupt business interests and having co-operated with Romania's communist-era secret police.
Mr Vosganian denied all the allegations but withdrew his candidacy on Saturday, saying he wanted to avoid a lengthy controversy that might harm Romania's image.
Scheduled to join the EU on January 1, both Romania and Bulgaria will receive seats on the EU's executive body once their nominations are approved by the European parliament in hearings at the end of November.
Mr Barroso said: "I am sure that Mr Orban, on the basis of his personal, political and professional experience, qualities and commitment, will successfully carry out the responsibilities that I wish to assign to him."
Those responsibilities will extend to the Commission's multilingualism portfolio, which will be detached from the broader brief currently held by Slovakia's Jan Figel.
A spokesman for Mr Figel said Mr Orban, whose CV includes English as a working language, would be responsible for marshalling the 1 per cent of the EU's budget assigned to translation and interpretation, and for overseeing the adoption next year of three new official tongues: Romanian, Bulgarian and Irish. The spokesman added that all Commission posts were "equally prestigious".
Mr Orban is not expected to face a serious challenge, though some observers fear he may lack political clout in Brussels. A foreign diplomat based in Bucharest described him as "very competent". "He certainly has in-depth knowledge of the EU and how it operates. He knows Brussels and they know him," he said.
Dorel Sandor, a political consultant and commentator in Bucharest, also praised Mr Orban as a technocrat. "He is an honest, professional and hard-working man," he said. "But his main vulnerability is his lack of profile. In Brussels, he will be considered a ghost."
Born in Brasov, Mr Orban served as deputy negotiator with the EU during Romania's accession talks, then chief negotiator for the final months of the process that ended in April 2005.
In December 2004 he was named deputy minister for European integration.
Mr Orban's brother, Ludovic, is vice-mayor of Bucharest and a prominent member of the Liberal party, one of two parties thatdominates the governing coalition.
The controversy over the Romanian appointment contrasts with that of Sofia's candidate for the Commission, promptly approved last week by Mr Barroso. He handed Meglena Kuneva, Bulgarian minister for European Affairs, the Commission's consumer protection brief.
Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2006 "FT" and the "Financial Times" are trademarks of The Financial Times.
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