PM Citu: Many in the public square do not know how to read a budget or just want scandal

Prime Minister Florin Citu said on Monday that the budget appropriations for the Ministry of Health this year are higher than in the last two years, and that there are many people in the public square who "do not know how to read a budget "or "they just want to make a fuss." "It's not true and that shows that we have a lot of people in the public square who can't read a budget, it's also an explanation for where we are with Romania today. There are a lot of people who speak in the public square without understanding how a budget is made, without understanding how to read a budget and they throw around information. Once again, the Ministry of Health has 11.43 billion lei [in public money] a bigger budget than last year, a special year with the biggest health crisis in the last hundred of years. We have allocated more resources in a year in which we will not have the same situation; in addition, there are almost 2 billion more than there were in 2019, when it was a normal year, so all these discussions in public are either because people don't understand and don't know how to read a budget or do they just want to make a fuss, which is sad because we still have to move on; the economy has to move on and we don't have to sit and educate people every day in how to read a budget," Citu said at the Parliament House before a meeting of the Executive Bureau of the National Liberal Party (PNL). He said that he had no problem with the minister of health and that he had not complained about the budget allocated to this area. The prime minister underscored that there will be no problems with paying the bills. "We have talked to everyone, the [ruling] coalition included, and we are still talking today. There is no dissension. The coalition leaders have committed themselves to a government deficit of 7.16%. (...) The budget was published last week to see if there are needs in some areas; some areas have been identified, but there are small amounts, some commitment appropriations. Yes, I think that the Ministry of Health will avail of more commitment appropriations, which means that they can make more contracts, but otherwise for the payment of bills to the Ministry of Development, to the Ministry of Transport, and to the Ministry of Health the money is allocated. There's no problem there. This is how we had discussions in previous years and you will see that there will be no problems with paying the bills," said Citu. AGERPRES (RO- author: Florentina Peia, editor: Mihai Simionescu; EN - author: Corneliu-Aurelian Colceriu, editor: Adina Panaitescu)