UPDATE/Parliament/No-confidence motion: PM Dancila: Did not expect motion to be sequence of lies

Prime Minister Viorica Dancila stated on Wednesday in Parliament's plenum she was not expecting the entire no-confidence motion, signed by the National Liberal Party (PNL), Save Romania Union (USR) and People Movement's Party (PMP), to be "a sequence of fabrications."

"I was not expecting the whole motion to be a sequence of fabrications, a presentation of almost another reality, made in bad faith. I understand the role of the opposition and its obligation to criticise the Gov't. This is part of the essential mechanism of democracy. But the way in which today, without any rational arguments, the opposition is undermining the Government's entire effort based on some allegations devoid of logic and realism, makes me believe that this motion only stands for a political game," Dancila stated at the debate of the censure motion "Ousting the Dragnea-Dancila government, a national emergency!"

The Prime Minister said she carefully read the text of the no-confidence motion and declared herself "disappointed". She added that she was hoping, despite the political adversity, for "a constructive approach of criticism", to the citizen's benefit.

"I was hoping we would be warned, corrected, even pulled at the sleeve regarding certain measures which might seem questionable from your perspective. You mystify reality to serve your own political interests. You present the bad as being good and the good as bad. In your speech there is no room left for nuances. Everything is black and white. Everything the power does is bad, and everything you do is good. These are the premise and the conclusion of the motion, which betrays an incredible arrogance with respect to the doubtful performance you had when you were governing. You refuse to admit even the most obvious good things that have happened during this government," Dancila said.

She added that for the opposition, the increase of the Romanians' wages is "a populist measure that will bring the chaos in the economy", and the rise of the minimum wages "an antisocial and anti-economic measure."

"For you, the exceptional economic growth Romania had last year is the result of the government's incapacity and incompetence. (...) In your view, the decrease of the government debt is actually a rise of the debt. Whatever this government might have done, whatever it might do, no matter how well things might go, for you it is impossible to get out of this paradigm of catastrophe, disaster and circus presented in Romania's Parliament."

Moreover, the premier affirmed that "many lies are circulating in the public sphere" about the amendments to the justice laws.

"We are unfortunately witnessing the amplest misinformation and intoxication of public opinion after the Revolution. There are many lies circulating in the public sphere and which obviously count on the emotional triggers that might catalyse a hostile, outraged and radicalised social reaction to the effort of the parliamentary majority to transpose into the criminal legislation the decisions of the Constitutional Court, of the European Court of the Human Rights and last but not least the Directive 343 of 2016 regarding the presumption of innocence," Dancila further said. AGERPRES (RO - author: Madalina Cerban, editor: Andreea Rotaru; EN - author: Simona Iacob, editor: Razvan-Adrian Pandea)