Prime Minister Nicolae Ciuca thanked, on Wednesday, the parties in the governing coalition – PSD (Social Democratic Party), PNL (National Liberal Party) and UDMR (Democratic Union of Hungarians of Romania) – for maintaining the coalition „stable,” which also makes their social and foreign partners place more trust in them, according to Agerpres.

In the opening of the government meeting, PM Ciuca said that the year 2022 „wasn’t easy at all,” with the government and the governing coalition facing a series of decisions „that helped dealing all the challenges of 2022.”

„We all know the context. We had to deal with a continuation of the crisis situation generated by the COVID-19 pandemic, followed by the energy crisis, followed by the security crisis, the war in Ukraine near our border and, of course, the impact that the economic crisis and inflation had. And I would like to emphasize, in this context, the benefits that our country enjoyed as a member of the European Union and the North Atlantic Alliance, the benefits that our bilateral relations with our strategic partners brought us, by helping us to make such decisions that ensured our social and economic stability. We can talk about economic growth and, of course, we can discuss measures to strengthen security and the safety of Romanian citizens,” said the head of Executive.

He thanked the governing coalition and those who contributed to the governmental activity.

„Internally, I would like to emphasize and thank the governing coalition. We have a stable coalition, as anyone could notice, made up of the parties that undertook the responsibility of governing – the Social Democratic Party, the National Liberal Party and the Democratic Union of Hungarians of Romania. Basically, it was thanks to this stability that we were able to convince all our social partners and also our foreign partners to trust us and take the opportunity to invest in Romania, an opportunity that materialized in the largest amount of foreign direct investments we had in one year,” stated Ciuca, at the beginning of the government meeting.

He added that, according to the National Bank’s estimates, the year 2022 will end with a approximately 11 billion euros in foreign investments.

„Of course, it was the year when we made operational the National Recovery and Resilience Plan. And we all know all these phases we went through, the quarterly phases, where we had to meet the milestones and targets according to the requirements and the reforms that we committed to carry out,” added Ciuca.

The Prime Minister said that, in 2023, the government will continue to support the economy and take measures so that there are no imbalances in the economy as a whole.

Ciuca also referred to all the measures taken by the government through the Support Programme for Romania, noting that they were measures meant to protect disadvantaged people.

„We made the decision to continue these measures through the 2023 programme and in this way make sure that we cover all the measures and all the decisions that can help the vulnerable population,” added Nicolae Ciuca.

The head of the Executive also mentioned the measures aimed at the protection of children.

„Social programmes were approved to give every child the chance for education and a better life. At the same time, we expanded the „Hot Meals in Schools” programme and vouchers for supplies and clothes were granted,” Ciuca said.

He said that there were also measures aimed at compensating energy prices and the decision to ensure a regulated price for the year 2023.

„Based on our analysis, we hope that we can also ensure the decrease of inflation in 2023,” added the PM.

Agerpres