The president held a press briefing at the time he was supposed to meet Dancila to talk about the tensions between the government and ruling party PSD, on one hand, and the central bank, on the other hand. Ruling party leader and Lower Chamber speaker Liviu Dragnea recently blamed Romania’s central bank for not acting to lower the inflation rate and denied that the rate spiked due to the government’s policies.
“The central bank’s main attribute is its independence from political will, the government, and other state authorities. It is obvious that PSD is questioning this independence,” Iohannis said at the press briefing.
The head of state also mentioned the secret memorandum cabinet members discussed last week concerning the relocation of Romania’s Embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. He said that he wasn’t consulted on this decision and argued that, according to the Constitution, the president and the prime minister need to collaborate “in Romania’s interests”.
“This was a big mistake because the President must be consulted on foreign policy matters, and this did not happen,” Iohannis said.
The president added that Dancila preferred to “follow party orders” instead of acting for the benefit of Romanians.
Under Romania’s Constitution, only the Parliament can dismiss the prime minister. The ruling party PSD together with its junior coalition partner ALDE hold a comfortable majority in the legislative body.