Voiculescu: The Government Has Failed To Contain The Crisis

Cătălin Deacu

Dan Voiculescu, the Founding President of the Conservative Party (PC), believes that, six months after having taken office, the Boc Government has failed to contain the crisis. In his opinion, the Government has made three major mistakes: "intentional" mismanagement of public funds, procrastinated investment projects and overwhelming taxation of the business environment.

Dan Voiculescu believes that the PSD+PC Alliance has an obligation to present the Coalition with a medium- and long-term strategy including measures for economic recovery and measures to ensure social welfare. In his view, such strategy will need to "rapidly correct the erroneous policies imposed by the Ministry of Finance."

"The principles of this plan should be to redefine the mixture of economic and fiscal policies so as to stimulate public investment and support the business environment while outlining a package of social actions focused on the economically challenged walks of life. Above all, efficient management of public money is imperative," he said.

• Widespread economic gridlock

"The Government"s intention to ask the IMF for clearance to increase the budget deficit while the Ministries of Tourism and Youth are throwing money out the window, the Ministry of Finance is giving unwarranted bonuses and the Ministry of Transportation is not spending the allocated funds is simply a way of lying to ourselves. Six months after taking office, the macro-economic indicators clearly show that Romania is facing a widespread economic gridlock, while the mixture of economic and fiscal policies proposed by the Government has failed to help restart the economy," Voiculescu said.

According to the Founding President of the Conservative Party (PC), the crisis containment programme proposed by the Government is based especially on burdening the business environment with new taxes, which amplify the social costs by boosting unemployment and causing payment gridlocks. "The Ministry of Finance has been only interested in increasing collection, while neglecting to stimulate the economy," Voiculescu concluded.