National Press Review, May 8

Under the headline “The Parliament has invested Ponta Government” –Jurnalul Național writes about the yesterday vote in Parliament. The publication comments regarding the result and notes the details of collaboration protocols that the Social-Liberal Union(USL) has agreed with National Union for Romania Progress (UNPR) and with national minorities. Also, there are listed the new executive’s priorities, among which the budgetary salary increasing and returning the money to pensioners who had paid it to the Health Insurance House (CAS). Prime-minister Victor Ponta has spoken yesterday also about the possibility of removing the compensation restriction for the nationalized houses –adds Jurnalul National.

România Liberă also approaches this subject and reveals the modifications that the new ministers are going to bring within their subordinate institutions. Referring to the public wages restoring plan –namely the increasing with 8 percent which will be applied the next month, followed by a new trance of 15 percent which is supposed to be applied in autumn –the author of the article sustains that” in order to give the second increasing of wages right before the parliamentarian election, the new Executive will have to do exactly what the Social-Liberal Union (USL) imputing to Mihai Razvan Ungureanu : to ignore the law that forbids taking of such measures with less than 6 months before a voting”

Adevărul points, in turn, the declarations made by USL leaders after Ponta’s Cabinet investing, as well as the critics brought to the government by the Liberal Democratic Party and UDMR. In addition, in terms of wages increases, the newspaper explains who will not benefit from these measures and exposes the statement of the Minister Delegate for Social Dialogue, according to which not all public employees have suffered in 2010 the revenues cutting with 25 percent and, accordingly, these will not receive the 8 per cent in addition announced starting next month.

Evenimentul Zilei analyses the effects of wage increases compared to the reduction of social contributions, which is now out of discussion. The newspaper specifies that, although the reducing of social contributions would have brought lower budget revenues, it would have had no effect on the economy and illustrates how this would be felt.

Evenimentul Zilei also presents the unhealthy food products, after checking made by the Institute of Alimentary Bio Resources from Bucharest. The publication synthesizes: Romanian products are healthier, the water from the tap is better than the one which is bottled and, in some cases, the eggs from the countryside are more carcinogenic than those from the stressed hens. Details regarding these aspects as well as the specialists’ arguments you will find within the article.

Translated by Alexandra-Diana Mircea

MTTLC, Bucharest University