Roberta Metsola always had politics running through her veins. She took up student politics, became a lawyer, an MEP and the European Parliament’s first vice president. She is now on the brink of landing herself the top seat in the EP. Matthew Xuereb looks at what shaped Malta’s high-flier politician.
When Roberta Metsola became a lawyer and specialised in European law, she knew this would be her future.
Born in January, 1979, and raised in Gżira, Roberta Tedesco Triccas went to St Joseph School in Sliema, St Aloysius College sixth form, the University of Malta and later specialised in law and politics at the College of Europe in Bruges as one of the first Maltese to embark on the Erasmus programme. She admits it was this experience that helped her shape her view on Europe.
In her student years, Metsola formed part of SDM (Studenti Demokristjani Maltin), the National Youth Council and was active in the Nationalist Party’s youth wing, MŻPN, before being elected as secretary general of the European Democrat Students.
In 2002, she was elected vice-president of the Youth Convention on the Future of Europe which paved the way to her being closely involved in the negotiation and drafting of the European Constitutional Treaty and, later, the Lisbon Treaty.
Metsola served within the party’s international secretariat and actively campaigned for a ‘yes’ vote in the 2003 EU membership referendum before unsuccessfully contesting the 2004 European Parliament elections.
She was still studying at the time and was asked by former prime minister Lawrence Gonzi to help explain the European Parliament to a younger audience.
In October that year, she joined the Permanent Representation of Malta to the European Union as the legal and judicial cooperation attaché, where she helped negotiate the Lisbon Treaty, serving under the wing of the former permanent representative to the EU, Richard Cachia Caruana.
“I first met Roberta on EU accession day in 2004 when she was a student at the College of Europe in Bruges. She joined the Permanent Representation through the normal application process together with many other excellent people.
“Over the eight years that followed, I saw her grow into the individual she is today: diligent, forward looking, always focused on the objective, able to bring people with very different ideas together, well-anchored in reality and superbly proud of what this country of ours is able to achieve,” Cachia Caruana told Times of Malta.
He said she was a key member of the team in Brussels working on very important dossiers for Malta, including the establishment of the European Asylum Support Office which is based in Malta and the legal questions that concerned the European Stability Mechanism and related EU legislation.
She again unsuccessfully contested the 2009 MEP election alongside her Finnish husband Ukko, who contested the same election in Finland. In 2012, she joined the European External Action Service as a legal adviser.
“Roberta Metsola is diligent, forward looking, always focused on the objective and able to bring people with very different ideas together”- Richard Cachia Caruana
She finally found her way into the European Parliament in April 2013 when she successfully contested the casual election to fill the seat vacated by former party leader Simon Busuttil, becoming one of Malta’s first female MEPs.
In the European Parliament, she was immediately involved in dossiers related to migration, civil liberties and security, championing causes like LGBTQ rights and ending mobile phone roaming charges.
Known as a bridge-builder, one of her first formal dossiers in the European Parliament was to represent the EPP Group on the negotiations for a roadmap to end discrimination and homophobia led by Green MEP Ulrike Lunacek.
In 2014, she was elected again on behalf of the PN with more than 38,000 votes, a then record for a female candidate in Malta.
Metsola was a leading voice on the need to respect the rule of law, the fight against corruption, the need for migration reform, press freedom and the need to bring European decision-making to a wider European audience.
In December 2019, Metsola made headlines when she was pictured refusing to shake hands with Joseph Muscat before a meeting with an EP delegation. The meeting happened in the midst of the Daphne Caruana Galizia murder fallout.
“If he thinks he can try to brush off responsibility he is sorely mistaken. Get out now, before you do irreparable damage to the country,” she tweeted after the meeting.
She was the EPP Group’s coordinator in the Committee on Civil Liberties, Justice and Home Affairs, between January 2017 and 2020. She was also the parliament’s rapporteur on the European Border and Coastguard Regulation in 2019 and was co-rapporteur on an anti-SLAPP report earlier this year.
Late last year, Metsola was elected as the European Parliament first vice president and is now intrinsically involved in the ongoing conference on the ‘Future of Europe’.
A mother of four boys, Luca, Alec, Marc and Kristian, the eldest being 14 and the youngest four, Metsola has a passion for cooking and baking, which she says she inherited from her paternal grandfather who was a chef with the Royal Navy.
Last week, she was chosen as the EPP’s candidate for president of the European Parliament. She stands a chance of being the woman who breaks another glass ceiling in Brussels, making her the first woman to hold the post of EP president since 1999. The election will be held on January 17-18, 2022 – a well-deserved 43rd birthday present for Metsola, who could join European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen in the union’s hierarchy – a momentous feat for Metsola and tiny Malta.