Romania’s Socialists and a hard-right party seek to topple the center-right prime minister

BUCHAREST, Romania (AP) — Romania’s leftist Social Democratic Party and the hard-right Alliance for the Unity of Romanians jointly submitted a no-confidence motion on Tuesday as the two political parties seek to topple liberal Prime Minister Ilie Bolojan.

The PSD, Romania’s largest political party that was until last week part of the coalition government, and the opposition AUR party, submitted the motion to Parliament, a day after the two parties announced the joint effort to bring down Bolojan, who is from the center-right National Liberal Party, or PNL, less than a year after his pro-European coalition was sworn in.

The PSD said in a statement that it had secured enough support for the motion against Bolojan. AUR leader George Simion told a news conference Tuesday that the motion had 251 signatures and vowed that it will pass “without any problems.”

The no-confidence motion will likely be voted in parliament next week.

The development follows PSD’s withdrawal last week from the coalition, which left Bolojan without a parliamentary majority and plunged the European Union country into a fresh political crisis.

Romania has faced a long period of instability after a presidential election was annulled in December 2024, and it is currently grappling with one of the highest budget deficits in the EU, rampant inflation and a technical recession.

Sorin Grindeanu, the president of PSD, said Monday that “there are many things that divide us … but there is a common goal, that of voting for this motion and toppling the Bolojan government.”

“I want to be very clear, it is a parliamentary initiative, it is an initiative that currently has support beyond political color,” Grindeanu said, adding that the motion was supported by the far-right nationalist S.O.S. Romania party, and other right-wing groups.

When the governing coalition was voted in last June, it pledged to make reducing the budget deficit a top priority. The PSD has often found itself at loggerheads with Bolojan over some of the austerity measures, which have included tax hikes, public sector wage and pension freezes and cutting public spending and public administration jobs.

In a statement Tuesday, PSD claimed Bolojan has “failed to implement any genuine reform” in his 10 months leading the government, and said Romania needs a leader who is “capable of collaboration.”

“In the complicated geopolitical context we find ourselves in, Romania urgently needs coherent leadership, without blockages and without political arrogance, which can ensure good administration and economic recovery,” the statement read.

If Bolojan is toppled, the PSD would be needed to form a pro-European parliamentary majority. The party has previously ruled out entering a government with AUR.

Siegfried Muresan, a Romanian member of the European Parliament from Bolojan's PNL party, says the prime minister has been implementing fiscal reforms as per the coalition agreement.

Bolojan is “serious about consolidating the budget, reforming the country, and respecting the commitments,” Muresan told the Associated Press. “The Socialist Party has now decided all of a sudden not to continue supporting this prime minister, to oppose the reforms and the measures which they all agree to in the coalition.”

Cristian Andrei, a Bucharest-based political analyst, says Romania will likely face “a long crisis” after the vote, which “breaks the pro-European coalition and offers the populist party, AUR, a place at the mainstream table.”

“For PSD it’s a power play and a way to get back in touch with and to signal to its former voter base that has migrated toward populist parties,” he said. “PSD wants to be great again, to regain the status of the party in charge. AUR gains a respectability aura and it shows a strong position in the Parliament, at the same time with PSD moving towards populism at speed.”

The prime ministerial position was set to be rotated in 2027 from Bolojan to a PSD premier as part of a power-sharing agreement. A general election is scheduled for 2028.

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McGrath reported from Leamington Spa, England.