THE HEAD OF ROMANIAN SPIES ABROAD Teodor Meleşcanu coming towards Cotroceni, from the left

The Party of Social Justice (PDS) yesterday notified the Central Electoral Bureau (BEC) that it would submit this morning the candidacy of Teodor Meleşcanu for the presidential elections, according to the spokesperson of the BEC, Marian Muhuleţ. Teodor Meleşcanu, former member of the National Liberal Party, has expressed his intention to join the presidential race, at the end of last week, alluding that he would enter the race if he succeeded in raising the 200,000 signatures needed.

Lawyers claim that raising signatures while Teodor Meleşcanu was still the head of the SIE (Foreign Intelligence Service) - a position he resigned from yesterday - was illegal and a serious violation of the electoral competition.

Colonel Mircea Dogaru, the head of military reservists, yesterday clarified the situation on all media channels, saying that Teodor Meleşcanu is an atypical presidential candidate, because he has never asked anyone to raise signatures, but rather he accepted an action originating from among the ranks of the civil society.

The head of the Reserve Military Personnel yesterday said that he has received requests from several NGOs to raise signatures for the candidacy of Teodor Meleşcanu. Mircea Dogaru said on Digi 24: "We have received such a request from the National Alternative, made up of NGOs of the civil society and small, left-wing political parties, I repeat: left-wing, not right-wing. For example, the Party for Social Justice. These NGOs have asked us to raise signatures for Mr. Meleşcanu meaning that, if the required number of signatures was raised, he would run for president. If Mr. Meleşcanu has resigned, that probably means that the required number of signatures was raised".

Political sources claim that Teodor Meleşcanu is the reserve candidate of the left, in the event Victor Ponta needed to withdraw from the presidential race.

Mircea Dogaru further explained: "He (Teodor Meleşcanu - ed. note) has accepted the proposal of the National Alternative to hand in his resignation after two years at the head of the Foreign Intelligence Service, to restore the balance of the Executive, which is dysfunctional, as the president gets elected for five years, has a clear political < affiliation >, the Government has a different political affiliation and is elected for four years. We want a little normalcy, and that is why we were rather happy with the proposal. I've heard that Mr. Meleşcanu had agreed to call for early presidential and general elections two years from now and at the same time cut the presidential term down to four years and to strip the presidential function of all its tyranny-enabling features, such as the appointment of the prosecutors by the president".

The Party for Social Justice (PDS) is a left-wing party, created in 2011. According to "Evenimentul Zilei", one of those who have contributed to the creation of the PDS as a response to the PSD was Octav Cozmâncă, a former social-democrat leader during the Iliescu - Năstase period.

Other founders allegedly include Tudor Mohora, Ion Sasu, as well as Ioan Toma, the least head of the Union of Communist Youth, according to www.evz.ro.

PDS also participated in the 2014 elections for the European parliament, where it got 0.24% of the votes (13,570 votes).

President Traian Băsescu yesterday sent a letter to the heads of the Senate and the Chamber of Deputies asking them to acknowledge the resignation of Teodor Meleşcanu from his position of the Head of the Foreign Intelligence Service (SIE), according to the Presidential Administration.

Teodor Meleşcanu, now aged 73, became the head of the SIE in 2012, after the resignation of Mihai Răzvan Ungureanu. The deputies of Meleşcanu at the SIE are generals Silviu Predoiu and Vasile Sarca.

• Tăriceanu: "Mihai Răzvan Ungureanu was a prime-minister on the next day"

The president of the Senate, Călin Popescu Tăriceanu, yesterday confirmed that he has received the resignation of Teodor Meleşcanu from the position of head of the SIE, and when it comes to his candidacy for president, he mentioned that the precedent of Mihai Răzvan Ungureanu exists, who "was a prime-minister on the next day".

Tăriceanu said: "Currently, I only have the resignation of Mr. Meleşcanu on the table, which I have acknowledged, I will inform the Senate as well. From now on, when it comes to his political plans I don't want to comment, because I am not habilitated to do so. (...) Mr. Răzvan Ungureanu was a prime-minister on the next day, so I don't see what the problem was".

The president of the Senate said that, according to the law regulating the SIE, the latter will be led by an interim director, namely the first-deputy of the SIE, with the appointment of a new head of the SIE and the vote of the Parliament to happen later.

The honorary president of the PNL, Mircea Ionescu Quintus, hailed the entry of Meleşcanu in the presidential race and did not rule out the possibility of some of the votes of the liberals migrating towards the former head of the SIE: "The position of Klaus Iohannis is so strong, that even if some votes actually went to Mr. Meleşcanu in middle or at the end of the presidential race, in other words in the second round, he couldn't be threatened".