President calls parliamentary parties to consultations on nominating Romania’s next PM

President Nicușor Dan will meet the parliamentary parties on Thursday, June 19, for consultations on nominating the next PM, the Presidential Administration announced.

The Social Democratic Party (PSD), the National Liberal Party (PNL), the Save Romania Union (USR), and the Democratic Alliance of Hungarians in Romania (UDMR) have been negotiating a governing program and the fiscal measures needed to reduce the budget deficit for the past three weeks.

Romania faces mounting pressure to close a widening budget deficit, which heads towards 8.6% of GDP this year versus the 7.0% target. The 2024 public deficit stood at 9.3% of GDP [ESA terms], above the 8.6% estimated by the Government in January or the 7.9% assumed under the initial form of the fiscal consolidation plan inked last autumn.

The term of the caretaker Government led by Cătălin Predoiu is set by the Constitution at 45 days and ends on June 20.

By June 30, the new Government needs to submit to the European Commission a package of measures to reduce the budget deficit.

Political sources told News.ro on June 17 that PSD, PNL, USR, and UDMR reached an agreement for a rotating government, a framework that has been in place for the past four years and which PNL, USR, and UDMR had opposed for the most part of the negotiations. In exchange for having liberal leader Ilie Bolojan as PM, they agreed, however, to have a PSD prime minister beginning in 2027, a year before the local and parliamentary elections, News.ro reported. Bolojan would have a right to veto the ministers in his cabinet, though.

PSD is the largest party in parliament, holding the most seats in the Chamber of Deputies and the Senate. Its bargaining power increased as it attracted more MPs from the suveranist parties POT, which made the parliamentary threshold for the first time in 2024, and SOS.

The leaders of PSD met on the evening of June 17 to discuss whether they would join the new Government but did not reach a final decision, Hotnews.ro reported. After the consultations on June 19, the party will hold an internal referendum to decide on the matter.

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