Romania's Liberal leader Ciucă comes up with "right-wing" bloc idea

Romania's Liberal leader Nicolae Ciucă (PNL), whose presidential candidacy may undermine his party's lucrative collaboration with the Social Democrats (PSD), reportedly came up with the idea of a "right-wing" bloc that would back in his presidential bid.

"We are continuing the negotiations this week with the right-wing parties. The right-wing bloc is possible with joint lists [for the parliamentary elections] to include the Popular Movement Party (PMP), Right Force Party, and REPER [besides PNL]. We can negotiate with USR for the second round [of the presidential elections] to support us," Ciucă said, according to sources close to the PNL leadership quoted by Aktual24.

The strategy, not yet announced officially by the Liberals and visibly not yet refined, seems more of a bargaining one, aimed at strengthening PNL's position in the coalition with the Social Democrats or a plan to create confusion among the right-wing parties.

Notably, the main right-wing party, USR, is not among the potential partners envisaged by Ciucă – at least not in the first stage. This is mainly because of the USR leader Elena Lasconi, Ciucă's rival in the presidential elections.

The newly elected USR president Lasconi is running for president against Ciucă and she recently criticised harshly the Liberals for their alliance with the Social Democrats.

"The PNL should do a little cleaning and sanitization [within their party] because now they cannot separate themselves from the Social Democrats (PSD). But I know that in the Liberal Party, there are people who know that this is not the right way, neither for them nor the country," Lasconi said a couple of weeks ago.

"With all due respect to you, I think it's already too much. Ciucă was disturbed by what Lasconi said about him. These days, we don't talk to anyone from the USR until they have a minimum of respect," sources within PNL said.

A right-wing bloc formed by Liberals with only small right-wing satellite parties [not including USR] would not be a genuine right-wing bloc.

Even assuming Liberals would eventually strike a deal with the USR, this might not be enough to create a ruling coalition, only a political crisis at most. In Parliament, the Social Democrats, even if backed by the ethnic Hungarian party and other independent MPs, might not be able to form a majority.

But this might be exactly what Nicolae Ciucă, whose electoral posters can be seen across the entire country, aims for.

However, the Social Democrats seem confident in their strong position both in the parliamentary and presidential ballots, and the gains Ciucă may derive from such a strategy are rather marginal.