The social democrat who wants to take the place of Paul Stănescu, critics for Bolojan: “You can go where you want, you don't scare us”
Social-democratic MEP Claudiu Manda stated on Wednesday that PSD no longer accepts the blackmail of Prime Minister Ilie Bolojan, saying about the head of the government that he threatens to leave office “if you don't do like me”. “You may go where you will, to the north, to the south, it is his lordship's liberty, but do not frighten us,” he commented.
These statements were made during the extraordinary conference of PSD Dolj, which nominated Manda as a candidate for the position of general secretary of the party at the November 7 congress. Currently, the general secretary of the social-democratic formation is Paul Stănescu.
According to Manda, if Bolojan were to resign, there is a protocol that stipulates that the PNL can appoint another prime minister.
“We don't want to keep silent and we don't want to resonate with blackmail anymore: if you don't do like me, I'll quickly tell sources that I'm leaving the position of prime minister. You can go where you want, to the north, to the south, it's his lordship's freedom, but don't scare us. There is a protocol, the PNL can appoint another prime minister, we can continue the things we assumed in the government program, but this kind of non-collegial it is something to wish for,” said Manda, quoted by Agerpres.
He stated that there are many colleagues from the party who ask why PSD is still in government, given that the party is fighting “with slogans or blackmail” from its governing partners.
“They should not be ashamed that we are PSD-ists. There were different opinions about the path PSD should take. Some say that the opposition would have been easier and a convenient choice, but PSD chose something else: responsibility, stability and assumption. We have demonstrated so many times that it is possible: it is possible to increase salaries, pensions, the minimum wage, the purchasing power of Romanians. It is possible to make investments in highways at the same time, express roads, regional hospitals, local infrastructure, water, gas. And it was possible when PSD governed. We can also perform externally”, added the MEP.
“Not under blackmail”
“There are many colleagues who ask us why we are still in government. And I want to say that we kept quiet enough, we let them criticize us too much. We took over the government with the PSD prime minister with a deficit of 9% and handed over the government with a deficit of 9%. But we showed that within this deficit we can make investments of maybe 10%, that there are resources to increase pensions and I tell you that we should not be ashamed of what we did at the governmental level or at the local public administration level. We are in a situation where we have demonstrated and we fight, unfortunately, rather with slogans or blackmail. It's very easy to come up with slogans 'we want reform and PSD doesn't want reform', it's not hard to say you want to do something and PSD is against it, when in fact PSD also wants the modernization of the state and reforms, but wants us to do things applied, not on leg, not on the knee and not under blackmail,” Manda added.
He also gave some examples in support of the statements – Ordinance 52 or the law on judicial pensions.
“And there are things that you all know from the public space: how Ordinance 52 came, in which Mr. Bolojan allowed all kinds of changes to be read on tape, and we found that there is no possibility for the local administration to buy paper for a birth certificate, for a death certificate or for a marriage certificate, that it no longer needs to make repairs, because they do not understand that if there is a hole in the asphalt, this is a repair, but of course they said 'let us correct after'. This kind of activity does not show that they are professionals, but rather superficial, that they want to do everything quickly and only as they want”, commented the MEP.
“That's what they did with the assumption of the law for the modification of pensions in the judiciary. They didn't want to wait for the opinion from the CSM just so that he could quickly be the first, although I suspect that maybe he wanted it not to pass. And then rather he didn't want to fulfill a formal condition. But he is brave”, Manda added.
Accusations from Grindeanu as well
Earlier on Wednesday, the interim leader of the PSD stated that he found out “from sources” that the law on magistrates' pensions would have been rejected by the Constitutional Court and on its content, if it had had the CSM's opinion and passed the form analysis. Grindeanu accused Prime Minister Bolojan of not having a dialogue with the magistrates and of not taking into account President Nicușor Dan's proposals regarding this law.
“Including the president of Romania, and you know this, he said that there are certain articles, as a result of the dialogue that his lordship had either with the High Court, or with the CSM, with the actors in the field, that should be reformulated. The transition period 15 years, for example. That's what the president said. This draft law initiated by the Government was not taken into account, nor the observations given by the president”, said the interim president of the PSD.
Ultimatum for Bolojan
Sorin Grindeanu argued that if Ilie Bolojan will act the same way he did when the law on the changes to magistrates' pensions was first adopted, then he must go home.
“The moment you enter the second time without dialogue with the actors in the field, in which you don't even take into account the president's observations, in which you assume that you meet certain deadlines faster, you don't stay 30 days, but after 10 days you think that's enough, the moment you think that everything is played in an area of personal pride, you assume this”, said Grindeanu.
“Let him go home if he continues to do the same procedure a second time without having a dialogue with all the actors, or at least take into account what the president of Romania says, then he must go home”, concluded the leader of the social democrats.
