On Tuesday, MEPs re-elected Roberta Metsola (EPP, MT) as President of the European Parliament until 2027, with 562 votes in the first round.

She won the election in the first round of voting, where she received an absolute majority of 562 votes cast out of 699 by secret paper ballot, among two candidates. She will continue to lead Parliament for the first two and a half years of the 10th legislative term.

Roberta Metsola (EPP, MT) 562

Irene Montero (The Left, ES) 61

Total votes cast: 699

Blank or invalid votes: 76

Absolute majority needed: 312

Born in Malta in 1979, she has been an MEP since 2013. She was elected First Vice-President in November 2020, and was Parliament’s acting President after President Sassoli passed away on 11 January 2022. On 18 January 2022, she was elected President for the second half of the 9th legislative term. She is the third female President of the European Parliament, after Simone Veil (1979-1982) and Nicole Fontaine (1999-2002).

Addressing the House after she was elected, President said: “Together, we must stand up for the politics of hope, for the dream that is Europe. I want people to recapture a sense of belief and enthusiasm for our project. A belief to make our shared space safer, fairer, more just and more equal. A belief that together we are stronger and we are better. A belief that ours is a Europe for all".

The President enjoys a broad range of executive and representative powers set out in the Rules of Procedure. Other than these duties, the President’s authority extends to “all powers that are necessary to preside over the proceedings of Parliament and to ensure that they are properly conducted”.

Article 14 of the Treaty on the European Union states that Parliament elects its President from among its Members. Since the first European elections (universal suffrage) in 1979, each President is in office for a renewable period of two and a half years. This means that there can be two Presidents in each legislative term. There have been 31 presidents since the Parliament was created in 1952, 17 of whom have served since 1979.

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