The interim president is Crin Antonescu, leader of the National Liberal Party appointed Speaker of the Senate just a few days before the Băsescu affair started, replacing Vasile Blaga, a conservative and coincidentally not one very loyal to the unseated president of the republic. If the July 29th referendum should confirm the impeachment, Antonescu will become the new president of the Romanian republic until the presidential elections planned for 2014 are held.
Whether or not this is a coup organised by Ponta to put an end to interferences by the president of the republic, the Băsescu affair – whatever the opinions of the theoreticians of painless democratic transitions may be – is yet another confirmation of the fragility of the institutional stability of Romanian democracy. Is Băsescu a sacrificial victim? Not exactly. The deposed president, not unlike the government leaders who wish to see him removed from the political stage, is certainly no saint. Corruption, abuse of power, conflict of interest and pressure applied to the press has marked the political careers of almost all post-Communist Romanian political leaders. This dark scenario is perfectly portrayed by one of the slogans most used this winter in street protests, “Please forgive us, we are unable to produce more than you manage to steal!”
Delegitimized by street protests and under close observation by the European Union, the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank, which in 2010 financed credit worth 20 billion euro, the country’s political elites began to crumble. For the moment only Băsescu and his cronies have paid the price, but it is clear for all to see that the power block created by Ponta could be the next to fall under the burden of institutional attacks. The current prime minister does not have solid roots. In power for only two months, he was appointed after Mihai Răzvan Ungureanu received a vote of no confidence in parliament having only served for three months after attempting to lead a cabinet already weakened by the resignation of it leader Emil Bloc, following violent protests against his anti-crisis measures.
Ever since his installation last May, Ponta has used emergency decrees to systematically avoid a parliamentary debate on institutional reforms, even changing impeachment laws, divesting the Constitutional Court of its consultative role and launching an operation to redefine the republican institutional organisation. Incapable of providing alternatives at a political level, the opposition reacted by discrediting the government. In a whirlwind of scandals, in just a few weeks three cabinet ministers were removed due to events linked to copied degree theses and fake curricula. Newspapers close to former president Băsescu have reported that Ponta himself allegedly copied his own doctorate thesis.
These are not just national tantrums and skirmishes. This is an open war between political formations that was observed by Brussels, resulting in the Commission urgently summoning Prime Minister Ponta to clarify the institutional collapse of the country and making him promise real action in order to guarantee the full independence of the judiciary, the reinstatement of the Constitutional Court’s full power and the appointment of super-partes mediator to supervise the preparation of new procedures for appointing the Chief Prosecutor of the Anti-Corruption Agency. In the absence of such measures being implemented, one possibility envisaged by high-ranking E.U. officials was that the Union would be ready to approve a package of sanctions against Bucharest, resorting to Article 7 of the Lisbon Treaty which envisages the suspension of a number of rights, including the right to vote in the European Council.
“I care greatly about the image of a democratic Romania, capable of resolving the internal debate with a political and popular vote,” answered Prime Minister Ponta, exhibiting a calming tone of voice and reiterating his readiness to back off any initiative Brussels might consider inappropriate. It is hard to believe him; especially if one is to believe the aggressive statements made by interim President Antonescu, who said, “I want to once and for all clarify that the president of Romania, even an interim president, does not take orders or instructions from anyone if not from the Romanian parliament and the Romanian people.” Barroso and his men have been warned.
Translated by Francesca Simmons
Image: Victor Ponta, Wikimedia commons