Romania‘s Social Democratic Party (PSD) will trigger early elections if the prime minister switch that was agreed to within the ruling coalition in December and which was supposed to have already taken place is not respected, said Social-Democrat MEP Victor Negrescu, noting his party is ready to lead, according to Euractiv.
The prime minister switch should have taken place on 25 May but was postponed by the biggest teachers’ strike in the last 18 years.
Asked why the social-democrat leader is not already prime minister, the MEP referred to the ”current political context”.
“PSD does not refuse governance, and we are not afraid to assume responsibility…We have prepared a government programme for the moment when the rotation of prime ministers will be carried out”, Negrescu said in an interview on Prima TV on Saturday.
”We have seen in recent weeks social tensions generated by the teachers’ demands, but there are also other problems related to the delays in the implementation of the national recovery plan (PNRR)”, Negrescu said.
According to him, the most likely scenario is that the prime minister’s rotation will be completed by the end of this parliamentary session at the end of June.
However, if the rotation is not respected, one option could be early elections, he added.
“For the PSD, things are quite clear, either we respect the protocol, or automatically the coalition can no longer function, and the only possible solution, the only alternative is to go back to the Romanians for elections, early elections”, he said, adding that the social-democrats do not want this scenario, but intend to go further with the coalition.