Former ELSTAT chief elected member of European Statistical Governance Advisory Board
Andreas Georgiou, the former head of the Hellenic Statistical Authority (ELSTAT), was voted as the European Parliament’s representative at the European Statistical Governance Advisory Board (ESGAB), the body that provides an independent overview of the European Statistical System.
The vote at the European Parliament’s Economic and Monetary Affairs Committee on June 15 came following the resignation of another member of the ESGAB, the European Parliament said in a press release.
Georgiou received 46 votes in favour, 2 votes against and 8 abstentions. The Greek statistician’s candidacy was supported by the spokesmen in the ECON Committee for the parties RenewEurope, EPP, S&D and Greens.
“In supporting his appointment, we do not only underline that he is a highly qualified and professional statistician and economist, who achieved a total reorganization and rebuilding of the Hellenic Statistical Authority, but in doing this, we also want to express our support for his brave fight for independence in the face of the unjust campaign against him in his home country, in Greece,” the spokesmen had said in presenting his candidacy.
Georgiou headed ELSTAT between 2010 and 2015, and is currently Visiting Lecturer and Visiting Scholar at Amherst College, in the US, where he teaches statistical ethics and macroeconomics. He is also elected member of the Council of the International Statistical Institute (2019–2023) and serving as member of the Committee on Professional Ethics of the American Statistical Association (2018–2020).
The former head of ELSTAT had been accused in Greece of falsifying budget data in order to justify Greece’s first international bailout, an accusation for which has already been cleared twice. The International Statistical Institute (ISI) has come out repeatedly in support of Georgiou and his work.
On its website, Eurostat says the ESGAB comprises seven independent members “with outstanding competence in the field of statistics.”
