The President of the European Parliament and her lobbyist husband – POLITICO

She has also been tipped as a potential future prime minister in her native Malta and, ahead of the EU’s changing of the guard this year, her name was being mooted as a possible replacement for European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen. She was easily re-elected to a second two-and-a-half-year term in July.

It is no mean feat for a politician from the EU’s smallest country, a country notorious for political corruption and not normally taken seriously when it comes to top EU positions.

Roberta has defined herself as an opponent of corruption and criminality. She sat on a parliamentary committee that investigated offshore companies used by corrupt politicians, including in Malta; she took it upon herself to wipe away the stain left by Qatargate on the EU’s only directly elected institution; and she demanded accountability for Maltese politicians involved in the murder of journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia, an anti-corruption crusader who was killed in a car bomb in 2017.

“She did so much for the cause of justice for my mother,” said the journalist’s eldest son, Matthew Caruana Galizia, an investigative journalist. “Roberta came to visit my grandmother in the hospital and at home and so on,” he said, praising her efforts to push through an EU directive known as “Daphne’s law” to protect journalists from legal harassment.

An attractive presence, the president inspires warm feelings, even among her political opponents. She has won admiration and even loyalty from anti-corruption campaigners and MEPs who said her efforts to increase transparency in Parliament were genuine.

“She was a strong supporter of many, if not most, of our policies,” said Aiossa, director of the advocacy group TI.