Romania’s former technocrat PM considers entering politics

Dacian Ciolos, Romania’s technocrat Prime Minister from mid-November 2015 until January 2017, said on Wednesday that considers entering politics but hasn’t made any decision in this sense yet. Ciolos presented on Wednesday, at the end of his cabinet’s term, an activity report showing what the Government managed to do in little over one year of activity. According to the report, during the Ciolos Government, the EU funds absorption rate for the 2007-2013 period reached 81%, the direct foreign investment increased by 10%, 155,000 people found a job, and the economy went up by 5%. During the press conference, Ciolos said that he doesn’t plan to leave Romania now that his term as Prime Minister has come to an end, but intends to find the best way to get publicly involved and use the experience gained while he led the Government, reports local News.ro. “Several collaborators or former collaborators from the Government already confirmed that they want to find a way to get publicly involved and exploit the experience from this year of mandate,” Dacian Ciolos said. He also stated that he is open to discussions about a future collaboration with the political parties that supported his platform for Romania during the electoral campaign for the parliamentary elections. Ciolos refused to get politically involved in the campaign for the elections. However, two political parties, the National Liberal Party (PNL) and the Save Romania Union (USR) said they would support him for another mandate if they won the elections. The two parties only got less than 30% of the votes. The Social Democratic party (PSD) won the elections with 46% of the votes and formed the new Government. Dacian Ciolos launched the Romania 100 Platform in mid-October last year. The platform states 10 principles Ciolos supports as guidelines for the country’s future development, regardless of political interests and electoral cycles. The principles include “a Romania without corruption”, “a responsible political class”, “a Romania without poverty”, “a competitive economy”, and “a Romania for all Romanians”, among others. Irina Popescu, irina.popescu@romania-insider.com