Romania's PM Tariceanu Says He Won't Resign Amid Floods

(Initially published in http://www.romania-report.ro/ - Jul 19, 2005; Source: Bloomberg)

July 19 (Bloomberg) -- Romanian Prime Minister Calin Tariceanu said he no longer plans to resign to push for early elections because his government must help the country recover from the worst flooding in more than half a century.

Floods killed more than 20 people in the past two weeks, destroyed hundreds of houses and bridges and forced the evacuation of more than 11,000 people.

Tariceanu, 53, said he would ask Parliament in coming days for a vote of confidence on a plan aimed at flood reconstruction and overhauling the judiciary to boost Romania's chances to join the European Union in 2007.

"It would have been cowardice to resign now,'' Tariceanu said today in a statement in Bucharest, without indicating whether he would quit later. "At this time I'm not interested in early elections, we have people suffering.''

Tariceanu first said July 7 that he would resign after Constitutional Court judges rejected parts of laws to overhaul the judiciary, including those that would have barred them from holding multiple judgeships. Their ruling also blocked other laws meant to strengthen Romania's bid to join the EU in 2007.

Romanian President Traian Basescu took note of PM Tariceanu’s decision and expressed his will to grant political support to the Government in targeting the January 1st 2007 as the date for EU accession. However, President Basescu said a favourable moment for early elections was just missed.

EU Threat

The EU last month threatened to delay the country's accession if the government fails to turn around its judiciary to fight corruption while enforcing antitrust laws.

Tariceanu, who also is the head of the National Liberal Party, had previously said twice he would resign even after parliament on July 13 again made changes to laws amended by the Constitutional Court. He said parliament's amendments wouldn't entirely bring laws on Romania's judiciary in line with the EU.

President Traian Basescu, who won presidential elections in November on a ticket with the Democratic Party, the liberals' main coalition partner, has also said he wants early elections to ensure the government no longer needs to rely on legislative support of the Conservative Party (former Humanist Party), the smallest in the four-party governing coalition.

"Accession to the European Union is the dream of every honest citizen in this country. We need to adopt courageous laws and decisions so that this dream can come true,'' Tariceanu said today. "In order to achieve this, we wanted a more comfortable majority in parliament.'' The Liberals and the Democrats also rely on the Hungarian Democratic Union ethnic party for parliamentary support.

The European Commission, the EU's executive arm, will report Oct. 24 on Romania and Bulgaria's progress toward meeting accession criteria. The report's findings could be the basis of a possible recommendation as late as April to the EU's 25 national governments to delay entry by a year until 2008.

Source: Bloomberg