ON HIS WAY TO VICTORIA PALACE Stolojan Needs To Go Through Parliament Palace

With a vitreous look, Traian Basescu announced that he had nominated Theodor Stolojan as Prime Minister. We all knew from the beginning that Basescu was going to appoint Stolojan. But, for ten days, PSD and PNL paraded on television saying they were not about to accept to be part of the Government, unless Geoana, respectively, Tariceanu, would be Prime Minister. One might have expected PSD to say "no, without Geoana as Prime Minister, we won"t be in the Government." But, as soon as Stolojan was nominated, PSD President Mircea Geoana said it was ok. He said it was ok to prove "flexibility." Or not to cause a crisis. He didn"t seem to protest Stolojan"s remark that he was exploring the possibility to bring UDMR on board, too, although PSD"s condition was to keep the Hungarians out of the Government.

Geoana"s reaction confirms that Basescu is the master of the political stage. The president said he was nominating Stolojan for a four-year term, and not for a rotating term split with PSD, as PSD had wanted. By making this announcement, Basescu practically interfered with the negotiations between the parties. Obviously, it is perfectly legal that the president should nominate the prime minister for a term of four years. It doesn"t matter whether the prime minister loses his office two days later, his full term is four years. Therefore, Basescu"s remark is redundant. It only makes sense as a PDL response within the negotiations with PSD. The master - Basescu. The prime minister - Stolojan.

I somewhat know Stolojan. He is probably fit to manage a crisis. He was prime minister between 1991 and 1992, which was also a time of crisis. At that time, he proved he could cut costs. However, under those circumstances, he did not have an opportunity to show that he can also allocate resources for development. In fact, in the year 2000, Isarescu, too, failed to prove that he was good at development and not just at harmonizing the regression.

The near future actually comprises "their crisis" and "our crisis" - the influence that the global crisis has on our economy, which is currently undergoing a structural crisis of its own (the investments that we make with borrowed money do not generate enough return to cover the debts).

Let"s see which crisis Stolojan will take care of. If he is validated.