Guido Rasi, Executive Director of the European Medicines Agency (EMA), has been forced from his job by a European Court of Justice (ECJ) ruling which concluded that his 2011 appointment had been flawed procedurally.
Rasi, a former Director General of the Italian medicines agency, was supposed to serve for at least five years, with his renewable term of office expiring in November 2016. But his appointment was challenged in 2012 by a Bulgarian medicines regulator, Emil Hristov, who alleged that he had been wrongly excluded from a shortlist of candidates for the job.
Hristov complained that existing EMA board members had also served on the selection committee and the ECJ’s Civil Service Tribunal agreed that this was wrong. Its ruling, on 13 November, concluded that 'the combined functions of a member of the selection committee with membership of the board of the EMA is likely to undermine the independence and objectivity of the people affected by this combination of functions'.
As a result, it scrapped the four-person shortlist from which Rasi was chosen in 2011, and also annulled his October 2011 nomination as Executive Director.
The European Commission and EMA are taking legal advice and it is not yet known whether they will appeal.
An EMA statement dismissed the reasons for the decision as 'purely formal grounds'.
Professor Sir Kent Woods, Chair of EMA’s management board, said: 'I note with regret today’s judgment by the European Union Civil Service Tribunal. It is important to remember that the ruling is about a procedural formality. It is not a reflection on Guido Rasi’s competence or ability to run the agency, something which he has done successfully since November 2011.'
In the meantime, pending further decisions, EMA’s Deputy Executive Director, Andreas Pott, will take over the management and operation of the Agency from Rasi.
The court told EMA and the European Commission to bear their own legal costs in the case and also share Hristov’s costs.
The ruling added that 'without passing judgment on the content of the discussions that took place between members of the selection committee' simply by serving on the board and committee simultaneously, two EMA board members 'violated their duty of impartiality'.
