Borderline personality
The fact that Emil Boc unsurprisingly won a second term as president of the Democrat-Liberal Party seems to have sealed his fate at the Victoria Palace. A scenario circulated through political and journalistic environments, yet formally denied, that was what Traian Basescu gave him back in return for his PM’s office. An apparently honourable exit, if we were to judge from the point of view of the not at all easy mission he has to accomplish in Modrogani: win back the PDL electorate in the year left until the local and parliamentary elections. Staying in power is crucial to the presidential party which, in its three years of rule, has managed to expand its influence to the entire society by an unprecedented politicisation of central administration – including public media organisations – and local administration, by distributing budget funds based on criteria of political affiliation, as the opposition vehemently accuses.
PDL is therefore not ready to surrender power, although, the way things look right now, it should at least start getting used to the idea. For the time being, it is as bad as it can be, with opinion polls showing PDL in free fall, approximately 30 per cent behind the Social-Liberal Union.
From that point of view, the president’s insistence in imposing a technocrat as a PM is understandable. In spite of his recent statements that the PDL score in the polls is no longer his concern, Basescu still wants an apolitical PM at Victoria Palace exactly because he needs someone to assign all the voters’ dissatisfaction to. However, it is highly unlikely that an apolitical head of government may be enough to cause the population to forget that the government was led by a PDL leader for three years. Apart from the hard core of PDL supporters, made up of relatively young people with an above the average living standard, Boc’s party has lost the sympathy of all social and professional categories, one by one, because of the tough measures taken against them. Starting with the retired people, whose pensions not only have not been updated to include inflation since 2009, but were also taxed by 5 per cent in the general context of massive food price rise and exploding fuel prices, continuing with the unions whose rights were diminished through the new controversial Labour Code, with the public sector workers whose salaries were slaughtered by 25 per cent and not forgetting the massive lay-offs in education and transport sectors. The police are definitely not going to forgive the government for its (failed for now) plan to lay off 9,500 Interior Ministry employees. Therefore, a change at the helm of the government is likely to be regarded by the great majority of the public as a mere PR stunt.
Miming democracy, the PDL National Council voted for ‘continuity’, with Vasile Blaga’s support faction being eventually brought to order and integrated into the leading structures of the party. The ‘reformists’ claiming the needed moral cleansing of the party, grouped around MEPs Monica Macovei and Cristian Preda and MP Sever Voinescu, came back to their senses and aligned themselves in a disciplined order behind with Boc’s supporters before the vote. That’s another way of demonstrating ‘verticality’ because, one has to admit: asking for privileges and offices from the position of a supporter is one thing, while doing that from an opposing position is a totally different matter.
It is more than evident that the endorsement of Emil Boc’s candidacy was just a strategy with ramifications going all the way to next year’s elections. Otherwise, no one could possibly understand why the party chose to elect the same person under whose leadership it collapsed to the lowest level in its entire history, on the one hand, and who ‘saved Romania’ from the financial and economic crisis, on the other hand. Boc’s campaign for the internal PDL election dwelled exactly on the rhetoric of coming out of crisis. While the PM has this ‘outstanding merit’ in the eyes of his colleagues, and was therefore rewarded with a new term as head of PDL, the same colleagues say – most likely at the president’s suggestion – that the government needs a new, ‘credible’ prime-minister, able to ‘revitalise the government’ as a PDL Deputy was stating earlier this week. This inconsistency of positions gives the impression that PDL is suffering from a dissociative identity disorder: on the one hand it praises Boc in the party and, on the other hand, it is digging his grave at the government.
It is more than evident that the endorsement of Emil Boc’s candidacy was just a strategy with ramifications going all the way to next year’s elections. Otherwise, no one could possibly understand why the party chose to elect the same person under whose leadership it collapsed to the lowest level in its entire history, on the one hand, and who ‘saved Romania’ from the financial and economic crisis, on the other hand. Boc’s campaign for the internal PDL election dwelled exactly on the rhetoric of coming out of crisis. While the PM has this ‘outstanding merit’ in the eyes of his colleagues, and was therefore rewarded with a new term as head of PDL, the same colleagues say – most likely at the president’s suggestion – that the government needs a new, ‘credible’ prime-minister, able to ‘revitalise the government’ as a PDL Deputy was stating earlier this week. This inconsistency of positions gives the impression that PDL is suffering from a dissociative identity disorder: on the one hand it praises Boc in the party and, on the other hand, it is digging his grave at the government.
Another signal announcing Emil Boc’s possible departure came from central bank Governor Mugur Isarescu, who, on Wednesday, criticised the ‘babbling’ of the government on the front of economic crisis. The governor says the decision to hike VAT affected the entire population and delayed the end of recession. With such signals, Traian Basescu’s plans to bring in a technocrat are running before the wind again.
Tokes to open Szekler Land’s diplomatic representation in Brussels
Social-Democrats ask the government and the Foreign Affairs Ministry to adopt “a firm stand” as soon as possible.
Three UDMR MEPs headed by European Parliament Vice President Tokes Laszlo want to open a Szekler Land diplomatic representation in Brussels. The three also issued an invitation to MEPs and the press to the opening, Realitatea TV informs, quoting dcnews.ro. The invitation bears the EPP heading, a European Parliament group that PDL is a member of. Bishop Laszlo Tokes has been an open supporter of the Szekler Land’s autonomy.
Catalin Ivan, the leader of Social Democrats MEPs, states that the situation is worrisome but people should not “become hysterical” either. “A kind of small embassies, diplomatic representations of cities and micro-regions, can be found alongside European institutions. But they represent the administrative-territorial units of those states, units that are recognized by law, by constitutions. This Szekler Land thing is silly. It also may be a provocation, an issue that would sound good for some. Almost everything bad that happens at European level usually has to do with an internal situation, with a crisis. I don’t know why Mr. Tokes is doing this. It probably also has to do with the fight between the two Magyar parties in Romania,” Ivan stated. He expressed his belief that the initiative of UDMR MEPs will not generate concern among the Democrat-Liberals, arguing that PDL is the one that supported Tokes in his bid for the office of EP Vice President. “We always knew that UDMR is looking more towards Budapest than towards Bucharest,” Catalin Ivan concluded.
Senate Speaker Mircea Geoana (PSD) was somewhat blunter than the leader of PSD MEPs. Yesterday he asked the government to adopt a firm position on this issue. “The initiative (…) represents a worrisome situation that has gone beyond normal attitudes and approaches in a state characterized by rule of law. The fact that Mr. Tokes and the other two UDMR MPs have already issued invitations for this event can even be considered a provocation. Although I believe a calm and rational approach is necessary at this point, I believe the Romanian government has to adopt a firm, clear-cut, unequivocal position on this issue. I want to remind you the fact that article 1, paragraph 1 of the Romanian Constitution points out that our country is a “national, sovereign, unitary and indivisible state,” Geoana pointed out in a press communiqué quoted by Mediafax, opining that the opening of this diplomatic representation in Brussels is “an illegal, anti-constitutional and anti-European thing.” In his opinion, the fact that Tokes is Vice President of the European Parliament and that his invitation bears the heading of the European People’s Party risks generating confusion for the Romanian and European public opinion that could be led to believe that the event is endorsed by the European Parliament or the European People’s Party.
Olguta Vasilescu, spokesperson of PSD departments, accused in her turn the government’s lack of reaction. Moreover, Vasilescu stated that Foreign Affairs Minister Teodor Baconschi shows no reaction to “the provocations that target the national, unitary, independent and indivisible character of the Romanian state.”
UDMR MEP Iuliu Winkler said the Szekler Land representation in Brussels would not violate the Constitution because “it’s not European lawmakers’ representation, it’s the two counties’, Romania Libera reports. Winkler added that he “firmly denies any kind of nationalist discourse about the initiative,” saying that the matter simply requires “us to admit that Romania’s regional development has a big problem and that the 7 per cent EU fund absorption rate is also due to development regions’ inefficiency.”
Senate Deputy Speaker Cristian Diaconescu on the other hand thinks UDMR MEPs’ action is “an offence to democracy in Romania, to Romania and the Romanian people, but also a useless provocation to the EU, which will undoubtedly be forced not to recognize the status claimed by Romanian MEPs.”
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