Political pact for European Romania

President Klaus Iohannis had talks with political parties on how to put into law the results of a recent referendum on justice.

Daniela Budu, 06.06.2019, 13:55

After two days of talks, president
Klaus Iohannis has announced that he has proposed all political parties the
signing of a political pact for European Romania. The signatories should pledge
that all their actions will fully respect the principles of the European
values, fundamental rights and liberties, democracy and the rule of law. The
initiator of the referendum held on the 26th of May, president
Iohannis has explained what the next steps could be after the pact is signed:

Putting into law the interdiction
to grant amnesty and pardon for corruption-related crimes, putting into law a
ban on the issue of emergency orders by the government in the field of crimes,
penalties and judicial organisation, correlated with the right of other
constitutional authorities to refer the government’s orders straight to the
Constitutional Court, as well as putting into law the necessary measures to
ensure the integrity of public offices and the revision of the justice laws
only while fully respecting the recommendations of the Venice Commission and
the European Commission.

The governing Social Democratic
Party (PSD) says it only found out about the president’s intentions from his
press conference and not from the talks. The party’s spokesman Mihai Fifor told
a TV station that a decision in this respect would be taken by the party
leadership on Friday. Mihai Fifor:

PSD is looking for a way to
implement the referendum. PSD has understood very well the wish of the Romanian
people and their vote in the referendum, but the pact specifically was not
brought up during the talks. Such a decision will be discussed by the party
leadership bodies, more precisely by the executive committee in a meeting on
Friday.

Calin Popescu Tariceanu, the leader
of the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats (ALDE), whose party is in the ruling
coalition, also said he was surprised by the president’s proposal given that no
mention was made of the pact during the talks. He says the idea distorts the
meaning of the referendum. Calin Popescu Tariceanu:

This announcement does nothing,
from what the president says, but distort the sense of the referendum. The
referendum was clear, it was about justice and was in no way about Romania’s
European path or pro-European orientation, which I don’t think anyone has
questioned, as Romania is one of the countries with the highest rates of
support for the European project. So, I would like to reiterate that this is a distortion
of what the referendum was about.

The National Liberal Party (PNL),
the main party in the opposition, has announced that it will sign the political
pact for European Romania and will campaign for the application of the pact.
The president of the party, Ludovic Orban:

We fully support the ideas in this
pact and all the solutions proposed by the Romanian president to implement the
will of the Romanian citizens. We call on all political parties in Romania to
support this pact, and those who until now have attacked the independence of
the judiciary, the European values and principles and the rule of law in
Romania must understand that it’s over.

The Save Romania Union believes the
reform of the Constitution should be more comprehensive, while the Democratic
Union of Ethnic Hungarians in Romania has proposed that the Constitution should
ban the use of emergency orders. We recall that on the 26th of May,
Romanians went to the ballots to vote in the European elections and a referendum
on changes proposed by the president in the area of justice. Of the 7 million
who cast their votes for the referendum, 6.5 million were in favour, thus
rejecting changes to the legislation using emergency orders and amnesty and
pardon for acts of corruption.