Negotiations and hearings

Political uncertainty continues to grip the capital city

Bogdan Matei, 03.03.2020, 14:00

The members of Florin Citu’s
Cabinet are this week appearing before Parliament’s specialist committees, a procedural
step before the investiture vote. This is the third round of hearings in a matter
of months. The committees will interview the same ministers whom they
interviewed last November, after the leader of the National Liberal Party
Ludovic Orban, took over as Prime Minister from Social-Democrat Viorica
Dancila, the same Orban who last month was ousted under a no-confidence motion
in Parliament. Orban was again nominated by the President, but the Constitutional
Court ruled against this nomination.

The only modification brought to the
current cabinet is Lucian Heius as the new Finance Minister, a position left
vacant when Florin Citu was designated Prime Minister. The Liberals say they
are negotiating with the other parliamentary parties, except the
Social-Democratic Party and the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats, in order to
form a majority. The Liberals account for 20% of Parliament’s seats, where the
Social-Democrats still hold the majority.

Therefore in order to pass, Citu’s
Cabinet needs votes from all sides of the political spectrum. Dan Barna, the
leader of the third-largest party in Parliament, Save Romania Union, said
following Monday’s talks that the Liberal Party has made no requests regarding
the investiture of the new Cabinet and that the meeting with Florin Citu was
strictly technical. In turn, Kelemen Hunor, the leader of the Democratic Union
of Ethnic Hungarians in Romania, says his party has not yet made any decision
to support the Liberal Government. The Pro Romania Party, made up of dissidents
from the Social-Democratic Party and led by the former Prime Minister Victor
Ponta, announced its members will vote against the new Cabinet. Finally, the votes
of the Social-Democratic Party and the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats seem
to be of little interest to the Liberals, whose obvious disinterest in the
current negotiations has prompted political pundits to say the Liberal Party
might still try to force early elections, based on its superior position in
surveys.

Early elections can be held if two consecutive governments are rejected
over 60 days and Parliament is dissolved. The President favors this scenario
and reacted to the Constitutional Court’s ruling against Orban’s second
nomination as Prime Minister, saying that chances to organize snap elections
have dropped below 50%. Experts say June 21 is the deadline for early
elections, as after this date Parliament can no longer be dissolved, as it enters
its last six months in office. Early elections have never been held in Romania
since the anticommunist revolution of 1989, no matter how much instability our
country has seen at political level.

(Translated by V. Palcu)