Romania: Press review - January 20

Bucharest, Jan 20 /Agerpres/ - The Romanian dailies on Wednesday give main coverage to a visit paid by a mission of the International Monetary Fund, the World Bank and the European Commission to discuss with the Romanian authorities the manner in which the requirements set in the Stand-By Agreement have been fulfilled and to draw up the assessment report required for the disbursement of the third and fourth tranches of the IMF loan, the second tranche from the Commission loan and the second Loan Programme for Development Policies offered by the World Bank; the dailies also focus on the unemployment figures expected this year, the taxation of wealth and traffic chaos brought about by the heavy snowfalls in the last days.

The government is looking for stopgap solutions in order to come out of a judicial deadlock caused by the excessive politicization of the deregulated institutions, Romania libera reports.

Members and sympathizers of the ruling Democratic Liberal Party (PD-L) cannot peacefully take their positions as chiefs of various institutions in the Romanian counties because their management has been illegal for some days.

Publishing of a ruling of unconstitutionality of the Ordinance no. 105 of 2009 in the Official Journal should have triggered the dismissal of the directors named by the No.2 Emil Boc Government in last autumn. However, this would mean to re-instate the chiefs of the older Tariceanu Cabinet, the daily explains.

The 2.3 billion euros to be disbursed by the IMF by the end of February will be shared between the Finance Ministry and the National Bank of Romania, but it will be for the last time that the IMF money get to the state budget too, chief of the Fund's evaluation mission Jeffrey Franks told Ziarul financiar.

'As we proposed as early as in October 2009, half the money will go to financing the budget deficit, but it is for the last time that this happens, because this was an exception we resorted to in special conditions, since the Fund's money is not meant for this purpose', Franks said.

Employers in various sectors of the Romanian economy say unemployment will hit the light industry, construction, steel-making and petrochemical industry this year too, the Bucharest-based papers report. The short-time working has so far been the life vest for massive layoffs.

The employees, the employers and the state would have stood to lose less than if the staff had been laid off - the employees would have been made redundant by receiving 75 percent of the wage and would not have cut off the relation with the employer, while the latter would not have closed the business and given up contracts; finally, the state would not have had to support the social security costs, the Romanian print media reports.

The Romanians that hold liquidity worth millions of euros in the local banks are looking to the Swiss banks, where they want to move their money to in order to escape the prospective introduction of a Romanian tax on wealth higher than 500,000 euros, Ziarul financiar announces.

'The wealthy Romanians first moved their possessions abroad amid the panic at the end of 2008. The people now are also asking and waiting to see what will happen to wealth taxation. Those who take their money outside the country look for safety, not gain', the head of a local bank's private banking division argued.

The union leaders announced they back planned legislation on setting a tax on wealth higher than 500,000 euros, Adevarul reports. 'The tax authorities want to tax the significant wealth and ask for the IMF's help', headlines Curierul National on this issue, while Curentul says: 'The tax authorities ask for the IMF's assistance to tax the wealth that is difficult to explain'.

The barometer survey conducted by the Romanian Institute for Strategy and Evaluation commissioned by Financiarul daily draws up the Romanian's portrait at times of recession: dissatisfied, but optimistic and still with a bleak outlook. Most Romanians are dissatisfied with the way they live and with their incomes, but also most of them are still optimistic, the survey shows. A majority of the polled do not believe the country is going to the right direction and the same majority surprisingly keeps total secrecy when asked if they are satisfied with their current jobs. The family gives most of the Romanians reason for satisfaction and peace.

Blocked roads, cancelled trains, difficult air traffic, stranded ambulances, storms, bumps or severe crashes and lots of snow have been seen by Romania in the last two days. Moreover, the hydrologists on Tuesday issued an alert to stay till Jan. 27, announcing that rivers all over the country will be iced over, Jurnalul National reports.

Romanian former soccer stars Gheorghe ‘Gica' Hagi and Gheorghe ‘Gica' Popescu will play on Jan. 25 alongside such famous footballers as Rivaldo, Rui Costa, Zinedine Zidane and Kaka a Game against Poverty on Estadio de la Luz, in Portugal, with the money from the tickets to be donated the victims of Haiti quake, Wednesday's sport dailies report. The game is promoted by the United Nations Development Programme. AGERPRES

[www.romaniapress.com]