December 16, 2004
Horse Trading
Hard haggling and much behind-the-scenes scrambling as both major parties struggle to form the next government.
New President Basescu has said that he'll put forward a Prime Minister from his own party. But (as noted in previous posts) his party doesn't have a majority in Parliament. No one does. So, horse trading.
It gets complicated because -- I'm going to simplify this -- PSD is unified, organized, well-financed and desperate; but on the other hand, Basescu is one stubborn SOB. So it could be an irresistable force vs. immovable object sort of thing.
The two smaller parties, UDMR and PUR, can make or break a government. They were very close to signing an agreement with PSD yesterday, but backed off at the last minute... probably because Basescu threatened to force early elections. Early elections might be bad for Basescu's party, but they'd be potentially lethal to PUR and no fun for UDMR either. So it's a powerful card to play.
(Constitutionally, if Basescu puts a PM candidate forward three times, and gets rejected by Parliament three times, then elections are mandatory. So Basescu could force it. Would he? Or is he bluffing? Can't say just now, but it adds an interesting twist.)
One big problem for Basescu is the perception that the Alliance is weak, indecisive, and internally divided. (I don't know if this is true, but that's the perception.) Even strong Basescu supporters seem lukewarm to the prospect of an Alliance government. Everyone remembers 1996-2000, when Romania went through a series of unstable coalition governments and the country seemed to suffer accordingly.
Will Romania have a government for Christmas? We're all watching with interest.
Posted by douglas at December 16, 2004 12:17 PM