REPORTERNET.COM

Romania's new prime minister, Mihai Razvan Ungureanu, won parliamentary approval on Thursday for a government that offers little political change but might ease some austerity measures as an election nears.

Four days after Emil Boc resigned as premier following weeks of sometimes violent street protests against an IMF-approved regime of spending cuts and tax increases, Ungureanu and the president, Traian Basescu, have nine months at most to reverse the fortunes of the centrist Democrat-Liberal Party (PDL).
Ungureanu, the 43-year-old foreign intelligence chief to whom Basescu turned to when Boc bowed to popular anger, has reshuffled the cabinet. But the make-up of the ruling coalition remains, which ensured the new line-up the backing of a narrow majority, securing 237 votes in the 463-seat parliament.
The leftist opposition Social Liberal Alliance (USL), led by Victor Ponta, boycotted the vote. It has been pushing for the parliamentary election to be held earlier than its November deadline to capitalise on its strong showing in opinion polls.
"I ask you not to continue the policies of the previous government," Ponta told Ungureanu in the chamber.
The new premier, a technocrat backed by a PDL that is languishing at less than 20 percent support in polls, made clear he would not abandon the austerity drive which has secured an International Monetary Fund bailout but has driven Romanians onto the streets in anger in the depths of winter.
"I don't come before you in these hard times to make unrealistic promises. An era of prosperity will not start tomorrow," he said before the vote. "We have a long way to go."



(source: www.ukreuters.com)