National Liberal Party (PNL) Chairman Ludovic Orban (photo L) accuses “purges” among liberal colleagues who support him for the party’s helm, in the September 25 elections, in which he is running against Prime Minister Florin Citu.”This management, that purges those who are against me, is not specific to a democratic party and has nothing to do with the PNL. Unfortunately, many people tell me within the PNL, that such threats are made in this campaign (…)” Ludovic Orban told B1 TV on Monday.
The PNL leader gave as an example 17 colleagues from Timisoara who were suspended from the party, but also the general school inspectors from Braila, Bucharest and Arges.”Many people were expelled from any public position for being my supporters. This is not right, it is not normal. Colleagues of mine who consider that they are not in the PNL, but imagine that they are in the Communist Party, in which purges are made, are dead wrong. We are the National Liberal Party”, added Ludovic Orban.
The PNL head specified that the current campaign in the party is taking place in an extremely strange context, but that he is convinced that a secret, free vote expressed by the delegations at this congress will certainly be in his favor.
Asked why not prime minister, PNL’s Orban says USR prefers Citu
National leader of the National Liberal Party (PNL) Ludovic Orban says that he does not currently hold the position of prime minister because the Save Romania Union (USR) in the negotiations for the formation of the incumbent government preferred Florin Citu.
“USR, in the negotiations we had, between me and Florin Citu they preferred Florin Citu. (…) Florin Citu was the first proposal (…), after five days of a stalemate in our talks, we made the office more flexible and we came up with two prime ministerial proposals, Florin Citu and Ludovic Orban. And at the negotiations, the ones who decided the prime minister between me and Florin Citu were the ones from USR,” Orban told B1 TV private broadcaster on Monday.
Asked if he regrets the fact that, in a conversation with President Klaus Iohannis, he nominated Florin Citu for the position of prime minister, Orban replied that he did not regret it.
“No, it’s premature to say that. When analysing a proposal, you have to think about how he performs his duties (…) for which you propose him. Usually, it’s hard to do an evaluation at seven months. Of course, there is always room for improvement. Of course, from a political point of view, obviously I would not have expected Florin Citu to be my opponent, but I do not regret that; in general, only when it is in the realm of evidence I regret a political decision that I made at one time or another,” said Orban.
Regarding the functioning of the governing coalition, the PNL national leader said that an ongoing dialogue is still needed in order to achieve a harmonisation of points of view.
I think that a prime minister must periodically find out about price of staples that affect purchasing power
PNL Chairman Ludovic Orban said on Monday that a prime minister must periodically find out about price of staples, which affect purchasing power.
Asked in a show on B1 TV if he knows the price of a loaf of bread, Ludovic Orban said that he consumes sliced bread, which costs about six lei, but that there is a tendency to increase the price of bread.
“I think that a prime minister, and here I am convinced that Mr. Citu really understood, must be informed periodically, even weekly, on the price, not only for bread, but also on some prices – the price for diesel or gasoline, the price per kilowatt of electricity, because they affect people’s purchasing power. (…),” said the PNL leader.
The answer of the PNL chair comes in the context in which, recently asked if he knows how much a loaf of bread costs, the prime minister Florin Citu answered that he does not eat bread.
Compiled from Agerpres
