On Tuesday, President Nicușor Dan had a working lunch with the ambassadors of the EU member states, at the end of which he held a press conference.
If the head of state made the same presentation of the political situation to European diplomats, as he did in front of journalists, then it would be fair to say that there are more questions about what is happening in Bucharest in Europe now than before.
Of course, a worse scenario would have been one where Nicușor Dan gave two different messages on the same day, but personally I am inclined to believe that that didn’t happen. .
These are the main ideas from president’s statements at Tuesday’s press conference.
- Saving the face of the PSD remains the sole concern of Nicușor Dan, although the crisis is deepening. How else can it be interpreted that the head of state ignores the reality that he now has two offers on the table for the appointment of the prime minister, speaking instead as if only one mattered to him, the PSD pick? In fact, Nicușor Dan slightly mocked the PNL-USR-UDMR choice for prime minister: “we are playing at the Prime Minister and the designation of the Government”. It’s clear that the president maintains this unconditionally friendly attitude towards the PSD in the context in which the PSD has just over 20 percent in Parliament, and the counter offer to the one made by the PSD, is MEP Siegfried Mureșan, infinitely more credible than Sorin Grindeanu and much closer to the often invoked “Western” dimension of the future cabinet (just compare the political CVs of those two, with an emphasis on the external influence of each one, and things will immediately be clear)
- President Nicușor Dan has an obvious problems in relation to reality, since, on the one hand, he says he does not understand why the Eugen Tomac option failed, and on the other hand, he insists that the simple fact that he considered that Tomac and Veștea would pass Parliament, means it should have happened. It’s as if a journalist has a headline and you start writing an article that matches the headline although it may not exist in reality. In various interviews, Nicușor Dan presented himself to the public as a mathematician. He didn’t lie. But today, this plays against him, since on the issue of appointing the prime minister, Nicușor Dan has not seemed like a man of figures: he’s been uncritical, with fixed ideas, disregarding data.
- The president seems to have lost his mojo and is becoming incoherent, but above all he persists in a kind of indecent intellectual arrogance and the I-know-better snobbery of the communist factory boss: he knows best, the rest know nothing, everyone should just comply. Or, in the words of Nicușor Dan, after being asked by journalists what he says to supporters who turned against him: “I tell them that I am a rational man and when a rational man makes a decision against some of his supporters, it means that he has a good reason. … Being a rational politician, in my opinion and with the responsibility and the oath when I was invested, I believe that I am right and I am leading Romania in the right direction.” Keep in mind that: “I think I’m right.” But let’s not forget that he considered in a rational and super-informed way that that Tomac would pass, that Vestea would pass, that the crisis would end within a reasonable time…
- President Nicușor Dan admitted in the press conference, finds it increasingly difficult to focus on the country’s fundamental problems and on honoring the promises made in the campaign, due to this political crisis. It’s good that he admits it, although you could see it from a mile off! But if he is truly aware of this, how can he explain the fact that he is constantly making moves that only perpetuate and amplify this crisis? And where does his air of superiority come from in his relation to the critics who tug him by the sleeve and tell him that he is walking down the wrong path?
It’s almost two months since the government fell and, according to the signals given on Tuesday by Nicușor Dan, there’ll be a few more weeks before we get a new one.
Probably, the head of state is now hoping that, in one some way or another, there will be an army in Parliament that will vote for the government that the PSD proposed to him and dictated its terms.
In the words of Nicușor Dan: “I am not asking for any agreement, any conditions, only for there to be 233 votes”.
It’s scary how flexible the president has suddenly become!
