For the first time in its 67-year history, BusinessEurope will be led by someone from Central and Eastern Europe. Maciej Witucki, chairman of Poland's Confederation Lewiatan, was elected unanimously at the organisation's Presidents' Conference in Dublin and takes over on 1 July 2026, replacing Sweden's Fredrik Persson.
BusinessEurope represents over 20 million companies through 42 member federations spanning 36 countries. It is the EU's largest employer federation and has direct access to every major institution in Brussels, from the Commission to the Parliament to the Council. Its president is among the most consulted business voices in EU policy making.
The choice of Witucki ends decades of Western European dominance at the top of the organisation. Poland is now the EU's sixth-largest economy — and since Germany's industrial model began struggling in earnest, an increasingly prominent voice on manufacturing competitiveness, energy costs, and EU industrial policy.
Witucki is not a newcomer to the Brussels circuit. Since November 2022, he has served as BusinessEurope's vice-president and as its special envoy for Ukraine — a role that gave him access to every major European capital and a central seat in debates over sanctions, reconstruction, and European security economics. His election was unanimous, which signals that Western and Northern member federations backed him without hesitation.
The timing carries its own meaning. Witucki's first day as president is 1 July 2026 — the same day Ireland assumes the rotating EU Council Presidency. Ireland's priorities for its six-month presidency include competitiveness, digital regulation, and the Single Market: themes Witucki's agenda directly addresses.
Witucki has made no secret of what he wants. Energy costs come first. He has argued publicly that without a genuine reduction in industrial electricity prices — and without a technology-neutral energy mix that includes nuclear power alongside renewables — European industry will keep losing ground to competitors in the United States and Asia. The competitiveness gap is not abstract: the chemical sector has been cutting European capacity for two years; heavy industry is following.
Regulatory burden is the second priority. BusinessEurope has long pushed for fewer and simpler EU rules, and a deeper Single Market that genuinely allows firms to scale across borders. Witucki takes over at a moment when the Commission is mid-way through its Omnibus simplification packages and when negotiations over the 2028–2034 Multiannual Financial Framework are beginning. The MFF will determine whether EU spending shifts toward competitiveness investment or remains locked in legacy support mechanisms.
Ukraine reconstruction is the third item on his agenda. As the organisation's envoy for Ukraine, Witucki built strong ties with Kyiv's government and business community. He is expected to use the BusinessEurope presidency to push European private-sector engagement in Ukraine's rebuilding — an argument that reconstruction contracts for European firms are both commercially valuable and strategically important for EU-Ukraine economic integration.
The appointment of a Central European to lead Europe's biggest business lobby marks a genuine shift in where the EU's economic voice comes from. Poland is no longer a recipient of EU industrial policy — it is shaping it. At the same time, Witucki inherits a difficult brief: European industry under sustained pressure from energy costs, US tariffs, and Chinese competition, with Brussels still deciding whether its answer is industrial policy, regulatory simplification, or both. How loudly BusinessEurope speaks in that debate — and how clearly it is heard — will define the next two years of European business politics.
