Corruption concerns have been raised amid an investigation into the billions handed out from the EU to NGOs, allegedly in exchange for lobbying efforts on behalf of the European Commission to advance left-wing causes such as the green agenda.
The European Court of Auditors has found that between 2021 and 2023, non-governmental organisations (NGOs) received a total of €7.4 ($8.4) billion from the EU, including 4.8 billion euros from the governing Commission and another 2.6 billion euros from member states.
Thousands of NGOs were funded with taxpayer cash to promote so-called EU values and advance left-wing causes on immigration, environmentalism, and even lobbying for the ban on combustion engine cars, Germany’s Focus magazine reported.
The Court of Auditors report, which found that there was “no reliable overview of EU funding granted to NGOs”, raised concerns that some such organisations were disguising themselves as NGOs to lobby politicians on behalf of their own economic interests while claiming to be non-profits or by government actors using the groups to advance their own ends clandestinely.
An unnamed research facility in the textile and cosmetics industry, which claimed to be an NGO to receive EU funding, was identified by the Court of Auditors as having pursued the “business interests of its predominantly for-profit members” while maintaining a non-profit status.
The watchdog report found: “Across EU countries, the definition of what an NGO is varies, and is rarely enshrined in national legislation. In 2024, the EU essentially defined an NGO as being independent from government and a non-profit organisation. While this is a step in the right direction, the definition alone cannot ensure that NGOs are correctly classified in the EU’s financial transparency system.
“This is because entities self-declare as NGOs, and the Commission does not check important aspects of their status, including whether a government exerts significant influence over their governing bodies or whether an NGO pursues its members’ commercial interests.”
The investigation was launched following the Qatargate scandal, which broke in 2022. Mostly leftist European Parliament representatives and officials have been accused of accepting bribes and other perks from the Islamic kingdom of Qatar as well as from Morocco and Mauritania to promote their agendas within the EU. It has been claimed that some of the payments allegedly given to Eurocrats were funnelled through NGOs.
The issue of NGOs influence on the political systems in Europe, long-criticised by populist figures such as Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, has come come under increased scrutiny in recent months following the decision by the Trump administration in the United States to scrap the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), which actively sought to promote liberal ideology and causes in Europe and elsewhere.
Members from the centre-right European People’s Party (EPP) have accused the Commission of paying NGOs with demands that they lobby for Commission goals, such as advancing the tenets of the leftist European Green Deal scheme. Last month, the Commission admitted that in “some cases” the arrangements with NGOS have “contained specific advocacy actions and undue lobbying activities.”
The issue of using public money to influence debates around the environment came into the fore in 2023, when Dutch newspaper De Telegraaf reported that the Commission had used taxpayer money to fund environmental organisations for the express purpose of lobbying on behalf of the green agenda of former EU climate chief Frans Timmermans.
In one instance highlighted by the report, 700,000 euros were taken from climate subsidies to pay supposedly independent organisations to influence the debate around farmers’ protests over draconian climate restrictions in a “green direction”.
In January, Monika Hohlmeier, vice chairwoman of the EU Parliament’s Budget Committee, said: “The contracts of the European Commission with lobbying guidelines infringe the principle of mutual respect among institutions and impinge on essential principles such as legislative independence, transparency, avoidance of conflicts of interest, fair and impartial distribution of funds, and accountability for the proper use of taxpayers’ money.
“We urge the Commission to put an end to this type of contract, to draw the consequences to avoid such scandalous one-sided methods in the future and to ensure that misused money is repaid.”
