Romanian President snubs Parliament, presides Govt’s meeting (Mar 1, 2007)

Mar 1, 2007 (Romania Report)

President Traian Basescu yesterday chaired the Cabinet’s meeting in order to boost commercial exchanges with China, Egypt, Azerbaijan and Qatar, as he said in a press statement. Meanwhile, during a joint session, the Parliament’s chambers decided to set a special commission to assess the opportunity of impeaching the President because alleged constitutional infringements.

Moreover, the Govt’s Web site does not include any images and/or any comment regarding President Basescu’s presence during the cabinet meeting on Jan 28 (sic!).

For those not familiarised with the Romanian domestic political environment the words above might sound odd if not strange.

Actually, to date, President Traian Basescu is at ‘war’ with both the so-called ‘allies’ in the ruling coalition (the National-Liberals) and the Social-Democrats, the Conservatives and the ultra-nationalists from the ‘Greater Romania party’ in opposition.

The country’s elections for the Euro-Parliament (to take place on May 13) represent the main issue that triggered this ‘war’. The Democrat Party (the key President’s supporter) is now way ahead in opinion polls. Therefore, all the other political parties made the ‘right’ choice — i.e. they spontaneously teamed-up in order to damage Mr. Basescu’s public image, simply because President Basescu is the most trusted politician by the likely voters.

This recently emerged ‘anti-Basescu party’ (led by the Social-Democrats and the National-Liberals) has in hand a wide range of political weapons—starting with parliamentary initiatives such impeachment, motions against pro-Basescu ministers, etc and ending with various hostile actions staged by PM Tariceanu (National-Liberal). The worse is yet to come.

On another hand, Mr. Basescu is expected to resolutely fight back. As long as the Justice Minister Monica Macovei stays in office, fresh court cases against corrupt top politicians might turn into hard blows to weaken the anti-Basescu alliance.

Unfortunately, following such a grubby ‘political war’ — expected take over the public scene for the months to come — the country’s agenda regarding the post-accession to the EU will significantly suffer.



Romania Report