The shock resignation of Mauro Ferrari as president of EU’s prime science-funding company actually adopted a vote of no confidence by his friends, it emerged on Wednesday (eight April).

After solely three months on the job, Ferrari dramatically give up as head of the European Analysis Council (ERC) on Tuesday (7 April), complaining of inner disputes on how to greatest sort out the pandemic.

However on Wednesday, 24 hours later, the scientific council overseeing the ERC mentioned they actually had all needed him gone already on the finish of March.

The resignation made instant headlines globally, after Ferrari revealed a long statement in the Financial Times, outlining his disillusionment with the European Union.

Ferrari had sought to set up a particular programme inside the ERC to fight the virus. The proposal was rejected by the ERC’s scientific council.

“The rejection of my motion was based on the notion that the ERC funds ‘bottom-up’ research,” mentioned Ferrari, noting that European Fee president Ursula von der Leyen had additionally personally reached out to him.

Ferrari mentioned he then put collectively a plan, with von der Leyen’s enter, but it surely shortly dissolved inside the administrative equipment of the European Fee.

“I have been extremely disappointed by the European response to Covid-19,” he mentioned, including that his work with von der Leyen had created an inner political firestorm.

However this version of occasions main to his resignation and von der Leyen’s private appeals to him have since been contested.

The European Fee’s chief spokesperson, Eric Mamer, stepped into the fray on Wednesday, after telling reporters that Ferrari was improper.

“It is professor Ferrari who reached out to the president. President von der Leyen did not solicit any proposals from professor Ferrari,” Mamer told reporters in Brussels on the each day noon briefing.

The ERC’s scientific council additionally hit again solely moments later, bullet-pointing all their complaints in opposition to Ferrari, whereas insinuating he had been mendacity.

“We regret professor Ferrari’s statement, which at best is economical with the truth,” they mentioned.

They additional declare Ferrari had, throughout his three-month tenure, “displayed a complete lack of appreciation” for the ERC’s position, that he spent means an excessive amount of time in the US, bypassed the ERC by going straight to the fee, and had too many different educational and business pursuits.

He’s, as an example, listed on the board of directors at US biotech firm Arrowhead Prescription drugs.

The European Analysis Council itself is appointed by the European Fee. One in all ERC’s vice-presidents has since taken over Ferrari’s management position till a brand new president is discovered.

The ERC was based in 2007 and has a €13bn budget spanning seven years.

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