Tonio Borg's nomination as European Commissioner yesterday hit another snag as the European Parliament's Conference of Presidents failed to agree on a common resolution for Wednesday's plenary vote.

Instead, they have opted for the rare moves of asking the Maltese candidate for further clarifications and having each political grouping come out with its own resolution.

Sources close to the EP told The Times that the move follows the objections raised by the Liberals, Greens and other small groups against supporting a common resolution proposing the nomination of Dr Borg.

The Conference agreed that EP President Martin Schultz should send a letter to Dr Borg asking for clarifications on seven specific points.

"The President accepted to write to Dr Borg for further clarifications, although we don't yet know what the seven points are," the sources said.

"Although this request will be made on behalf of the smaller groups, Dr Borg will need to come out with convincing replies to sway those MEPs, particularly in the Socialist group, who have not yet made up their mind."

Dr Borg, who if selected would hold the health and consumer affairs portfolio, could not be contacted for comment yesterday. During the hearing last Tuesday, he was grilled about his personal views on gay rights and divorce following statements he had made in the past.

Under normal circumstances, the hearing would have been followed by a common recommendation for the approval or rejection of a nominee.

In the wake of the disagreement on Dr Borg's nomination – which comes in spite of the glowing reviews he received for his performance during the three- hour grilling – the different political groupings have decided to each prepare an individual resolution to be presented to the European Parliament.

The EPP remains the only group supporting Dr Borg.

The Liberals and the Greens were against while the Socialists were undecided and will only take a position on Tuesday evening.

"The Socialists will be the determining factor. Following the hearing, all the indications were that they were convinced about backing Dr Borg. It seems that their position is once again swaying and resistance from certain quarters in the group has persisted despite Dr Borg's convincing performance," the sources said.

Many Socialist MEPs, including the Chairman of the Environment Committee, Matthias Groote, agreed that Dr Borg gave a good performance on Tuesday but the positive sentiment was seen to weaken a day later and has continued to change right up until yesterday.

Swede MEP Anna Hedh sent a message lobbying her colleagues to vote ' no' to Dr Borg. Even British Labour MEP Michael Cashman, who during the meeting said he was impressed by Dr Borg, has changed his mind.

"I've given this a lot of thought and I cannot endorse Mr Borg," Mr Cashman, who also leads the LGBT inter- group, posted on Twitter.

Evidence that further trouble is brewing for Dr Borg's nomination was confirmed when EPP President Joseph Daul, who was due to speak at a bureau group meeting in Malta yesterday, decided to stay in Brussels.

MEP Simon Busuttil told colleagues during the opening of the meeting that Mr Daul decided to skip his visit to see Dr Borg's nomination through and to make sure Malta gets its seat back at the European Commission.

While addressing the bureau meeting, Dr Busuttil said that what had happened at Dr Borg's hearing this week was the opposite of what the European Union stood for, which was the principle of unity in diversity.

"This week we saw diversity coming under attack. Unity in diversity does not mean that we should all be the same. Unity in diversity means that we respect each others' differences. The moment we stifle diversity we will be killing the union. We will be killing Europe," he said.

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