There are more and more voices who voiced intention today to restore the ruling coalition with USR. Even the Liberal interim PM Florin Citu admitted it. This is confirmed also by the Liberals’ existing ruling partner, UDMR.
PNL chairman Florin Citu seems to have changed his mind on USR. Before the first meeting with USR today, Citu said that there are enough votes for a PNL-USR-UDMR government to be sworn into office. He mentioned that talks with PSD as well are scheduled today, but the party’s mandate is to find a majority around a Liberal PM.
After the meeting with USR, Citu stated that the discussion with USR was a very good one and resembled “a group therapy”. PNL chair said they had talked about the principles of forming a new Cabinet led by a PNL prime minister, as well as about the ruling programme and the conclusion of the a new coalition agreement.
“We have not discussed about the person to be named PM, but only about the principle that the premier must be from PNL, we have not mentioned any names (…) There are high chances for the coalition to be restored, I was optimistic after the talks”, Citu said.
While the Liberal leader Citu voiced his optimism on restoring the coalition, USR chairman Dacian Ciolos had a more guarded and nuanced stance , rather voicing his skepticism in this stage. “I don’t go by feelings. I’ll believe it when I see it“, Ciolos said.
Earlier in the morning, Kelemen Hunor, UDMR chairman, said that in his opinion the first option of a coalition would be with USR. There are also possibilities with PSD, which leads to a clear, comfortable majority, but this means that the Social Democrats will claim the position of prime minister, said the UDMR leader.
“There are possibilities with both the USR and the PSD, but you have to see what the desideratum is, you have to give a longer, bigger, more consistent perspective, no matter which direction you go, otherwise a majority cannot be formed stable, a constructive majority cannot be formed and we wake up in three, four, five months with the same problems, so if you don’t open a perspective, you don’t give a substance, this also means the problem of collaboration after 2024, it’s hard to do a stable Government “, the UDMR leader told RFI.
Kelemen Hunor said that the first coalition option would be with USR: “Of course, the first option would be with USR, in our view, the same way we hit the road almost one year ago. This means 52%, 52% of the Parliament. It is a simple majority, if we also add the Orban group, we must negotiate with them, it would mean 56%”, he explained.
Deputy Prime Minister, Liberal Dan Vîlceanu also said that PNL-USR-UDMR would have 240 votes, but the parliamentary arithmetic shows that a possible rebuilding of the coalition strongly depends on yet another parliamentary faction.
“If we do a summary calculation, you will see that this is not the case. (…) Mathematics is mathematics. There are at least 240 votes on the USR version. Let’s not force mathematics more than necessary “, stated Dan Vîlceanu, who is said to be one of the supporters inside PNL for rebuilding the governing coalition with USR.
Before the political crisis and the PNL Congress, the Liberals had no less than 134 seats in Parliament and, together with those of USR and UDMR, there were 243 votes, which provided a relatively stable parliamentary majority. Some MPs from the Minorities group would add to that.
234 votes are needed to invest a government. If the PNL-USR-UDMR-Minorities Coalition were rebuilt in the current parliamentary configuration – a simple calculation would thus have 246 votes together. In this equation the problem is with Minorities. Specifically, seven of the 18 MPs from the Minorities refuse to vote to restore the PNL-USR-UDMR Coalition, as they have always been closer to PSD, more precisely 7 parliamentarians have always voted with PSD. The majority would be extremely fragile and insecure 239 votes out of 234 required.
Violeta Alexandru leaves the PNL group in Parliament
However, Ludovic Orban announced on Wednesday that he and his MPs will not vote for a PNL-PSD government, but want to rebuild the right-wing governing coalition with USR, in other words, they could also vote for a possible new PNL-USR -UDMR majority.
So far, 17 Liberals left the PNL parliamentary group, joining the Orban’s team. The last MP to do so is deputy Violeta Alexandru, who was also Labour minister in the Ludovic Orban Cabinet in 2020.
PSD wants the PM seat
On the other hand, a PNL-PSD coalition would mean a more comfortable majority from the start: 276 votes. If we add the UDMR votes and part of the Minorities’ ones, the parliamentary majority would be overwhelming: 312.
Provided that PSD, backed up by 157 seats in parliament, reclaimed the position of Prime Minister in a future alliance with PNL. SocDem chairman Marcel Ciolacu announced today that in the event that he enters the Government will unequivocally demand the position of Prime Minister.
Ciolacu announced today that PSD is willing to assume the governing, so it will go to the consultations with President Iohannis with a proposal for the PM position. “This circus in the past 2 months must end,” he stated, adding that PNL and USR’s approaches on the political crisis are still “arrogant and superficial”.
However, UDMR will also submit a PM nomination. Kelemen Hunor announced on Facebook today that UDMR will have a PM proposal at the consultations with the head of state for a new Cabinet.
“I do not consider it a misplaced proposal that in a future coalition – whether it will be a PNL-USR-UDMR or PNL-PSD-UDMR coalition – the prime minister should be given by the smallest party, the one that represents stability. We can talk about the fact that UDMR has only 6-7% in the parliament, but this is not important! ”, Hunor argued.