April 7, 2015 UPDATE
A roundup of domestic and international news
Mihai Pelin, 07.04.2015, 19:53
On Tuesday, the Romanian Parliament amended the article in Parliament’s Rules of Procedure on the number of votes needed to lift the immunity of a member of parliament. The law was brought in line with the Constitution, so that the decision to lift immunity to be made on a simple majority vote of the attending MPs. On the other hand, the Constitutional Court is to review on April the 8th the notifications filed by President Klaus Iohannis and other political players, including the National Liberal Party in opposition, after the Senate turned down a request by anti-corruption prosecutors regarding the arrest pending trial of former transport minister Dan Sova, accused of accessory to official misconduct. The request was approved by a majority of the Senators attending the meeting, but it was eventually dismissed on grounds that the meeting was lacking quorum. The President has stated Parliament’s attitude in such cases has led to an institutional jam that hinders judicial procedures and obstructs justice.
The National Statistics Institute in Bucharest announced a downward adjustment of its economic growth forecast for this year, from 2.9% to 2.8%. In another move, the Institute improved its estimate of the GDP growth in the last quarter of 2014, to 0.7%, compared to 0.5% as it had previously estimated. The industry and communications sectors have made the most substantial contributions to the GDP. According to the National Statistics Institute, new orders in the processing industry increased in the first two months of this year, by 1.4%, as compared to the corresponding period of 2014, mostly due to the rise in operations reported in the durable and intermediate goods industries.
The Government of Romania on Tuesday decided to reduce the value-added tax for foodstuffs, non-alcoholic beverages and food industry services from 24% to 9%. The measure will be implemented as of June, six months before the new Fiscal Code takes effect. For the rest of the products, the VAT will be lowered from 24% to 20% as of January 1st, 2016. For bread, the VAT was slashed to 9% in September 2013. According to experts, the increase of the VAT from 19 to 24% in 2010, in the context of the economic crisis, led to a mere 1.5% increase in revenues to the state budget. The Government believes this reduction to encourage consumption and implicitly the economic growth, although there are also voices that warn that a VAT decrease would widen the budget deficit. PM Victor Ponta says however that the measure will not affect the state budget balance.
The Republic of Moldova on Tuesday commemorated six years since the so-called “Twitter revolution” of 2009, which led to the ousting of the communists. The communist party, in power at the time, was accused of rigging the legislative elections, and on April the 7th their opponents organised a large-scale street protest which spiralled into violent clashes. At least one protester was killed and several hundred others were arrested. After the protests in April, the Opposition blocked the election of the country president in Parliament, which led to early elections won by the pro-European parties. We’ll have more on this after the news.
The US once again called on Greece to finalise a reform plan worthy of the financial support of its lenders, the US Treasury said on Monday, at the end of a meeting with the Greek Finance Minister, Yanis Varoufakis. The day before, he also had a meeting with the IMF director, Christine Lagarde, and the two tried to dispel fears that Athens will not be able to pay on Thursday the 450 million Euro owed to the IMF. Greece is waiting for the EU to provide 7.2 billion US dollars, the last instalment in a 240-billion euros bailout programme offered by the European Union and the IMF since 2010.
The Romanian tennis player Simona Halep, no 3 in the world, was nominated for WTA best player of the month of March, alongside American Serena Williams and Spain’s Carla Suarez Navarro. Halep (aged 23), already voted as the best player of February in the WTA website poll, won her first Premier Mandatory title, at Indian Wells, and in Miami she reached the semi-finals, and was defeated by world leader Serena Williams. In 2015, Halep has also won the tournaments in Shenzhen and Dubai.
