Damanaki nominated as Greek commissioner

Greek government nominates Maria Damanaki for European commissioner.

The Greek government on Friday nominated Maria Damanaki, a member of the ruling Pasok party, to be the country’s next member of the European Commission.

Damanaki, 57, was elected to the Greek parliament in 1977 as a member of Greek Communist Party and later for Synaspismos, a left-wing party whose president she became in 1989. She won a place in parliament for Pasok, a socialist party, in 2003.

Damanaki, a chemical engineer by training, has been a member of the parliamentary committee on culture, science and education.

Greece’s outgoing commissioner, Stavros Dimas, served as European commissioner for the environment.

The nomination of Damanaki, who in 1995 published a book in Greek entitled “The female face of power”, brings the total number of female candidates for posts in the college of commissioners to seven. Two more countries, the Netherlands and Denmark, are also expected to nominate women. This would bring the total to nine, one more than the number who currently sit in the current Commission.