Armed with the backing of European Commission President Jose Barroso and Bulgarian Prime Minister Boiko Borissov, European Commissioner-designate Roumyana Zheleva was set to face a confirmation hearing in the European Parliament on January 12 2010 that was seen as certain to include questions about her husband Krassimir’s business associates.
 
Zheleva, currently Bulgaria’s Foreign Minister, a sociology graduate who served two years as an MEP after the country joined the EU in 2007, has been nominated for the portfolio of international co-operation, humanitarian aid and crisis response.
 
She has been the subject of allegations of being less than forthright about potential conflicts of interest, on the basis of her banker spouse’s supposed connections. Zheleva denies any suggestion of impropriety, and in response to allegations aired by Greens MP Daniel Cohn-Bendit and Die Welt, has said that she would take court action against the German newspaper.
 
Speaking two days ahead of Zheleva’s hearing, which is scheduled to last three hours, Borissov said: "Roumyana Zheleva will sit a hard exam in a few days. There were many lies about her. I am convinced of her qualities. She will manage excellently".
 
The EC and Bulgaria’s Foreign Ministry made public the text of a letter from Barroso backing her on the eve of the hearings.
 
"Ms Zheleva has assured me that her declaration, like the declarations of the other Commissioners, is completely in compliance with the Code of Ethics," Barroso said.
 
Other voices have spoken in support of Zheleva. Writing in Bulgarian daily Standart, New York-based journalist and author Martin Dillon ascribed the smear campaign to a rearguard action being fought by Bulgaria’s former communist old guard and said that while he did not usually advocate court action in such matters, Zheleva should "sue the socks off" Die Welt.

Borissov and the Zheleva camp have said that her husband is a middle-management figure with no questionable connections. Media reports sympathetic to Zheleva described him as anything but the figure that, in the words of Die Welt, made Zheleva a "gangster's wife" but in fact Krassimir Zhelev was a banker "who takes the bus to work".
 
Andrei Kovachev, an MEP for the party of which Zheleva is a member, Borissov’s GERB, said that he was confident that Zheleva would pass the test on January 12.
 
The hearings involve committee members questioning candidates – who previously had to submit written documentation including on the question of conflicts of interest – on their abilities, specifically in regard to their portfolios.
 
Each Commissioner-designate is heard by the relevant portfolio committee, although non-members of the committee may be allowed to participate in the hearings.
 
The European Parliament’s only option is to reject or accept a candidate EC as a whole, and it cannot cherry-pick. Some media reports have named Zheleva as among the supposed "weak links" that could sink the whole candidate Commission, but most views were that the January 26 2010 vote in the EP would see the EC approved on schedule to take office in February.

The nomination of Zheleva, who holds a senior post in the centre-right European People’s Party group, was criticised at the time of its announcement by the socialist bloc, which also derided the "lightweight" portfolio allocated to her.
 
Against this background, Bulgarian socialist MEP Evgeni Kirilov said, according to news agency Focus, that Zheleva’s portfolio was "so insignificant" that it was unlikely that the hearing would generate any drama.
 
Ivailo Kalfin, who was foreign minister from 2005 to 2009 in the now-defunct socialist government and currently is a socialist MEP, was among those who, at the time of its announcement, interpreted the portfolio offered to Zheleva as a slight to Bulgaria.
 
On the eve of her hearing, Kalfin said that Zheleva had the same chance as any other candidate, and it was up to her to do well.