It is impossible for Romania to close this year with a deficit below 8%, as the current deficit is higher than the one announced at the beginning of the year and in the middle of the year, prime minister Ilie Bolojan stated on Tuesday evening.
When asked during a broadcast aired by private television broadcaster Antena 3 whether the budget deficit had actually reached 10-11%, the head of the Executive explained: „We are not in this situation, no, but it is obvious that, between the data that we officially received when we took charge as a government and the data that we discovered later, of course, we saw that there were many expenses that were not included in the budget, like future payment commitments. (…) The deficit is higher than the one that was announced at the beginning of the year and in the middle of the year. That’s why, when I was asked by economic journalists what deficit we will close at, I told them, very correctly, that we cannot close this year below 8%, with all the measures that we’ve taken, for two reasons: on the one hand, because these measures were taken at the beginning of the second semester and they only have effect on the last four months of the year, some of them, while some other apply from January 1, and on the other hand we have some very large investment contracts in the works that we cannot stop”.
The prime minister also mentioned that at the time of taking office the deficit was „exceeding 9%,” but a 10% deficit was not reached.
„I think it was exceeding 9%, but we did not reach that point [of a 10% perfect deficit – editor’s note]. (…) Keep in mind that last year we had a 9.4% deficit, so we were in a similar situation, and even if at the end of last year some measures were taken to cap some rights for this year, you should think about the fact that, when we are annualizing them, certain salary or pension increases that were made in 2024, I don’t know, from March, from June, from September, you must think that this year they entered for all the 12 months, and instead of decreasing, for example, our salary expenses at the country level in the first semester, as was estimated, by 5%, they increased by 10%,” explained Ilie Bolojan. AGERPRES
