23rd November 09 – Neelie the elephant
She’s not really an elephant but merely a behemoth beast. Neelie Kroes has done it again. The European Competition Commissioner has done it again ; eaten Angela Merkel for breakfast. Just as well for the German Chancellor that she rode to victory in the elections on the back of saving thousands of German Opel jobs by backing the Canadian car parts firm Magna to buy GM Europe assisted by the Russian bank Sberbank.
Kroes broke up the Dutch bank ING, played a starring role in the reduction of Lloyds Banking Group and RBS and now has helped persuade GM that they might as well do their own thing with their European business since by the time Neelie has felled another tree, the answer will be about the same. Of course, the Russian bear is sore.
Few items of news have occupied more column inches in the credit crunch aftermath than what the bankrupt GM Motors would do with its European wing. With 25,000 jobs at stake in mainland Europe and 5,000 in the UK plus probably as many again in the ranks of distributors and ancillary trades, it was and still is one of the major fall-outs.
Well, the Americans have stood their ground and the sovereign governments will have to put up if they want to keep the business in tact. All this talk of the new European Constitution and whether there will be a European President seems a bit pointless. We already have the most powerful person in Europe firmly in place. Not nearly but Neelie.
More at www.jgwalkersmith.co.uk
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