Further extending the governmental limbo, Romanian President has again refused to sign the appointment of two ministers proposed by Prime Minister Viorica Dăncilă, Olguţa Vasilescu for Development and Mircea Draghici for Transport.
A former judge of the Romanian Constitutional Court, Augustin Zegrean says that in his reading of the constitution, the president can refuse to appoint the ministers proposed by the prime minister as many times as he deems fit, and has considerable latitude in giving arguments for the refusal.
Meanwhile, the political rift between the Social-Democrat (PSD) government and the liberal (PNL) president keeps widening, even as Romania took over the revolving presidency of the European Union in a half-year which will also see elections for the EUropean Parliament in May. Iohannis – who previously stated publicly that the Dăncilă-government is unsuited for the role, now criticized its failure to produce a budget for 2019.
“Where is the budget draft? PSD should have submitted it by November 15 but there is no budget even at this time. (…) It should be desirable to take all necessary steps to have a budget for 2019”, Iohannis said.
He also announced that he will again run for president at the next elections at the end of this year.
