Ophef over voorzitter Europese Conservatieven en Hervormers (ECR) in het Europees Parlement (en)
EUOBSERVER / BRUSSELS - A fresh wave of existential turmoil has enveloped the European Conservatives and Reformists (ECR i) group in the European Parliament, as internal Polish divisions threaten to undermine the coalition of 54 MEPs.
Members are likely to discuss the chairmanship of Polish MEP Michal Kaminski at a crunch meeting in Strasbourg on Tuesday evening (23 November) after he recently announced he would leave Poland's Law and Justice Party (PiS), the second largest component of the ECR group after the British Conservatives.
Sources suggest Mr Kaminski is likely to maintain the position, but the infighting comes as a further embarrassment to the UK's Tories who have already faced criticism over their choice of European partners.
"There can't be any move to remove him from the chair as there is no procedure to do so," one EU i source close to the discussions told this website. "An absolute majority [of 28 MEPs] could kick him out of the group altogether, but this is highly unlikely."
Mr Kaminski has said his decision to leave Poland's Law and Justice party is based on its recent lurch to the right.
"I cannot accept that my party is being taken over by the far right, and being dominated by the far right," he told The Telegraph late last week. "I don't like the direction Law and Justice is going so I'm going my own way now."
He is not alone. Three other MEPs have left or been expelled from the Polish party this month, all members of a team which successfully steered the PiS towards a more centrist position in a bid to get party president, Jaroslaw Kaczynski, elected as the country's president in July.
Analysts say right-wing hawks have since captured the party since Mr Kaczynski failed to take over from his brother, Lech, who was killed in the Smolensk plane crash in April.
Jacek Kurski is among Polish MEPs who now feel Mr Kaminski should step aside. "I expect that it will be pointed out to the alliance of parties that something must change following these [Kaminski's] comments," he told the Guardian. "There must be a change to consolidate our group."
For the moment the group of out-of-favour MEPs look set to stay within the ECR group, but this could change in the future if a new Polish political party was established by the PiS dissenters.
A drop below 50 MEPs as a result of such a move would severely threaten the group's chances of securing parliamentary committee chairs in the future, with British Prime Minister David Cameron i likely to face fresh criticism over his decision to lead the Tories into a European grouping now labelled as "far right".
In an ongoing battle over the size of next year's EU budget, Mr Cameron successfully persuaded a dozen EU colleagues this month to sign a letter insisting that spending increases be limited to no more than 2.9 percent on 2010 levels.
But the British leader would have had an even greater say over this and other issues important to the UK, say critics, if he had not decided to lead his party out of the centre-right European Peoples Party group - the largest in parliament.
"I think the whole thing is unravelling," said Edward McMillan-Scott, now a Liberal Democrate MEP after being kicked out of the Conservatives for his opposition to the alliance with the Law and Justice party.
"It again highlights Cameron's massive strategic error in abandoning the mainstream for a fragile alliance with extremists," he told the Guardian.