Romania’s Finance Minister Contradicts Prime Minister Ciuca: “There Is NO Hole in the Budget”

Romania’s finance minister Adrian Câciu contradicts Prime Minister Nicolae Ciucă, who admitted there is a hole in the state budget. The minister of European Investments and Projects, Marcel Bolos, also admitted Romania’s Government is considering layoffs and salary cuts in the public sector.

The ministers are in different political parties – while the Socialists propose the Finance minister, the Prime Minister and the minister for European Investments are Liberals.

At the beginning of the Government’s meeting on Thursday, Prime Minister Nicolae Ciucă says:

We have decided that at the level of the Government, a decision discussed in the Coalition, to identify those fiscal measures through which we can better consider the expenses to ensure that we fall within the deficit limits at the end of the year. All these measures came from when, at the end of the first quarter, we found a deficit in the collection. The deficit mainly belongs to the big taxpayers. I make a public appeal to the big taxpayers to pay their debts to the state, and at the same time, I give a task to the institutions to do in such a way as to ensure the collection of these revenues.

Romania’s Prime Minister on the hole in the state’s budget

On top of that, even President Klaus Johannis admitted the problematic situation of the state budget. However, he also said that there won’t be salary cuts or lay-offs as long as he still has the power to influence decisions. Yet, he called for a better collection of taxes.

Minister of Finance Adrian Câciu contradicted both and denied there was a hole in the budget. On the contrary, he named the situation “a preventive action.”

There is no hole in the budget. It’s not a hole. It is a preventive action.

Romania’s Minister of Finance Adrian Câciu on the hole in the budget

The situation seems not to be the perfect case scenario. Yet, it seems that Romania could pass the seriousness of that all by a better collection from the big taxpayers.

At the beginning of the year, OMV, one of the big taxpayers in Romania, announced it refuses to pay the so-called solidarity tax, as the company’s representatives announced the company is not subject to such a tax in Romania.

Will the Romanian Government be able to collect better by persuading the big taxpayers to contribute to the state’s budget as they should? It’s just a few days until companies should pay their term taxes, and the Government’s competency will be visible.