Finance minister, the Liberals’ first choice to lead Romania’s new center-right Government

Romania’s president Klaus Iohannis and the leader of the National Liberal Party (PNL), former prime minister Ludovic Orban, have reportedly agreed to name Liberal finance minister Florin Citu to lead the new center-right Government taking shape after the December 6 parliamentary elections.

Ludovic Orban and Florin Citu both had separate meetings with president Klaus Iohannis on Wednesday, December 6. After these meetings, Orban presented the proposal to the other PNL leaders to get their endorsement, G4Media.ro reported.

The Liberal leaders approved Citu’s nomination. They also agreed to support Orban for president of the Chamber of Deputies.

Orban, who has been at the helm of a Liberal Government with minority support in the Parliament since November 2019, resigned on Monday, December 7, after his party’s defeat in the parliamentary elections. He implied he would not try to get a new nomination as prime minister but said he would get involved in the negotiations for creating a center-right ruling coalition.

PNL, which took little over 25% of the votes on Sunday, will join forces with the USR-PLUS alliance (15%), and the Democrat Hungarian Union (UDMR) to form a new Government, leaving the Social Democratic Party (PSD), which got a score of almost 30% in the elections, in opposition. The Liberals excluded carrying out negotiations with PSD and the Alliance for Romanians’ Unity (AUR), a nationalist party that took over 9% of the votes in the elections.

Orban had to step down to make this coalition possible, as USR-PLUS leaders said they didn’t want to be part of a Government led by him. However, the Liberals will likely keep the prime minister seat. The party had three potential candidates for this position: defense minister Nicoale Ciuca, who took over as acting PM after Orban’s resignation, finance minister Florin Citu, and EU funds minister Marcel Bolos. However, USR-PLUS leaders and civic organizations objected to appointing a military (Ciuca is a retired general and former chief of the Romanian Army) as prime minister.

Ludovic Orban reportedly told his party colleagues how he and president Klaus Iohannis agreed on appointing Florin Citu for prime minister. Iohannis, who is a former teacher, apparently told Orban that they should each write on a piece of paper the name of a potential PM and then compare notes. According to Orban, they both wrote the same name: Florin Citu,