The PSD and the PNL did not agree on merging the European parliamentary elections with the local ones, the main problem being the lack of a consensus regarding a common presidential candidate given by the social democrats, something unacceptable to the liberals, claim sources from the Coalition for “Adevărul “.
PSD and PNL did not reach a common denominator regarding the FOTO Inquam merger
“With the merger, it remained very good: at the moment we have elections according to the law. We have four rows of choices. As we had overlapping crises, this year we will also have overlapping elections, in a single year, four rows of elections“, stated Marcel Ciolacu. Then, different messages began to flow from the ranks of the PSD regarding the fact that the party does not necessarily want to merge any series of elections, but only wants to know the exact calendar for them in 2024. What the social democrats do not say is that in the Coalition they asked supporting the PSD representative in the presidential elections, as a single candidate, in order to agree to the merger. For the rest, the other things could be negotiated more easily: joint candidates in some cities, possible agreement for female parliamentarians and cooperation at the local level. But the PNL is also firm on its positions: liberal presidential candidate.
In fact, according to “Adevărul” sources from the PNL leadership, the liberals would only be willing to ask for the head of a forum in the Parliament and the presidential candidate, and in return they would have no claims to the prime minister, the future mayor of the Capital, the European commissioner and one more head by legislative body. The liberal leaders do not trust the fact that Marcel Ciolacu or any other future PSD president would keep his word and appoint a PNL prime minister after December 2024. “They would tear parliamentarians from us, take other parties from AUR, then would govern with the UDMR”, said a PNL leader for “Adevărul”.
A new discussion will take place on Friday, but the chances of a deal have fallen sharply. Several social democrats claim for “Adevărul” that they have nothing to lose if the elections are held separately, because the contribution of the merger would be a maximum of another 2 percent in the case of the PSD, while for the PNL it could be up to 6 percent.
The scenarios on the table
At the moment, there are several scenarios on the table in the Coalition. The first is the one with all elections on time, according to sources from both sides of the Coalition, which is also the most likely. A second scenario is that of the merging of the MEPs with the local ones and only a few agreements of joint candidacies for some city mayors. The third scenario, which also led to the current misunderstandings, is the one in which the joint presidency is established, and an electoral alliance for female parliamentarians, where the ratio of forces in the Parliament, but also the number of mayors of each one, will be taken into account. A fourth scenario is the one in which parliamentary and presidential elections merge, which happened in Romania until 2004.
The coalition is under pressure to make the decision by the end of the week, because, otherwise, it will not have time to prepare the necessary regulatory acts for the merger.
