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| PENSIONS STIR UP TENSIONS (11.07.07) |
| (2007-07-11) |
| Last updated: 2007-07-12 15:31 EET |
The Romanian President and Prime Minister are again at each other’s throats. This time, the issue pitching Traian Basescu against Calin Popescu Tariceanu is a pension increase for roughly 6 million people, most of whom live on the breadline, after a life’s work. The outcome of the confrontation, irrespective of its winner (the President or the Prime Minister) will bear on witnesses on the sidelines, that is pensioners who have been glued to TV sets and radios to follow closely all official statements. President Basescu has said he will only promulgate the new pension law, recently adopted by parliament, after the government presents him the funding resources necessary for its application. ‘I don’t want to promulgate a false bill which will later be suspended due to lack of funds, Basescu said.
“I don’t want to block the pension law. On the contrary, I will promulgate it, but I will do that even if it takes sending it back to Parliament, in order to have a clear conscience about doing the right thing, at a time that is essential for pensioners. The account upheld by party leaders, according to which I am against the pension increase is pure demagogy.”
As part of the opposite camp, the labor minister and the finance minister respectively have presented the grounds of the pension increase and given assurances that such a measure will by no means harm the state budget. Prime Minister Calin Popescu Tariceanu has reinforced this stance:
“I want to make one point clear: government representatives attended parliament debates. They brought documents and figures that demonstrate what is possible and what is not possible. A certain threshold was agreed upon, according to data provided by the Finance Ministry and the Labor Ministry. So ministries involved in this pension increase have put forth serious grounds for this measure to take place.”
Opposition Social Democrats, also in the quarter made up of Basescu’s opponents, accuse the president of refusing the promulgation because it was they who initiated the pension law. Social Democrat leader Mircea Geoana:
“There is no reason whatsoever, either legal, constitutional, or financial for the president not to promulgate this law. I’m not aware whether the president had asked for a financial justification when promulgating the dignitaries’ wages increase, a few days ago.”
Politicians of both camps trade in accusations bearing in demagogy and political hypocrisy. The battle’s winner will, most likely, get the votes of the 6 million pensioners at this fall’s Euro Parliamentary elections or next year’s general elections.
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