Клаус Хайнер Лехне: Еуропалық аудиттік соттың бұрынғы президентінің өмірбаяны

Klaus Heiner Lehne (born 28 October 1957 in Düsseldorf, Germany) is a German lawyer and politician who has been serving as member of the European Court of Auditors (ECA) since 2014. From 2016 until 2022, he was its 11th President

Beforehand, he was a member of the European Parliament for the Christian Democratic Union (CDU) which is part of the European People's Party political group. In his previous national and European parliamentary career, spanning more than twenty years, he served among other things from 2009 to 2014 as political group coordinator and then Chair of the European Parliament’s Committee on Legal Affairs and concurrently as Chair of the Conference of Committee Chairs.

After his A levels, Lehne studied law, physics and philosophy at the universities of Freiburg, Cologne, Bonn and Düsseldorf from 1978 to 1986. Following the conclusion of his studies, he took up a position as a lawyer in Düsseldorf. His brother Olaf Lehne is a member of the Parliament of North Rhine Westphalia since 2005.

Lehne joined the Christian Democrats when he turned 18, in 1975. He became a member of the City Council of Düsseldorf in 1984. In 2003, Lehne became the chairman of the CDU Kreisverband Düsseldorf. Upon nomination as Member of the European Court of Auditors in March 2014, he was succeeded in this function by Thomas Jarzombek.

In early 2014, the German government nominated Lehne as the German member of the European Court of Auditors for six years; following a positive opinion by a majority of the European Parliament the Council appointed him as Member. He served in Chamber III, which is responsible for auditing external EU policies. the ACP Investment Facility, EU support for the fight against torture and the abolition of the death penalty. On 13 September 2016, Lehne was elected President of the European Court of Auditors, becoming its 11th President. Under the Rules of Procedure of the Court of Auditors, the President shall: (a) call and chair meetings of the Court and be responsible for the proper conduct of the sessions; (b) ensure that the Court's decisions are implemented; (c) ensure that the departments of the Court operate properly and that its various activities are soundly managed; (d) appoint an agent to represent the Court in all litigation in which the Court is involved; (e) represent the Court in its external relations, in particular in its relations with the discharge authority, the other institutions of the Union and the Member States’ audit institutions. On 12 September 2019, he was re elected for a second term of three years running until 30 September 2022. On 23 October 2019 he presented the Court Annual Report for the Year 2018 to the European Parliament's plenary session in Strasbourg.