The budget draft for 2008 makes some waves in the newspapers on Thursday, facing more and more criticism. Comments range from "electoral" to "socialist" budget, the general impression being that the Government begins to abuse the much too praised "economic growth".
Other news being neglected by the general interest on the heat wave (which threatens to return during the week-end), some newspapers choose to make their own news, thus finding out that half of all parliamentarians are or were at least once under criminal investigation.
Romania Libera takes advantage on the lack of news and puts up a top of all-time criminal files in Romanian politics. The analysis shows that about half of the senators and deputies were at least once under criminal investigation, some even facing official charges in courts.
Crimes range from corruption to accessory to manslaughter, from money laundering to causing lethal accidents.
The political party with the largest amount of criminal files on the names of its members is the former governing Social Democrat Party, PSD (40 files), followed by far by Conservatives who, although only have the votes of 1% of the populace, have six major criminal files, all on the names of party leaders.
Former Romania president Ion Iliescu and the president in office, Traian Basescu accuse each other of supporting the corruption in Romania.
Iliescu believes that Basescu has a medieval mentality, being a "pretender for the throne" surrounded by "well intended oligarchs who helped him become president".
As response, Basescu accuses Iliescu of crimes during the 1989 Revolution and the 1990 miners' mayhem in Bucharest, while his spokesman qualifies Iliescu's statements as "Soviet - inspired propaganda", Evenimentul Zilei reads.
"Populist laws will affect the state budget", is the headline in the same Evenimentul Zilei, less critical than the "Socialist budget for 2008" headline in Cotidianul.
The pensions' growth, subsidies for farming equipment, incentives for the "surviving spouse", higher wages for teachers, compensations for the retired people and even larger pensions for former military - these are the "electoral bribe laws" counted by the most newspapers.
Jurnalul National also points at the main resource for financing the promises: a 9 billion euros budgetary growth in 2008, with a 3.5% inflation rate and a 2.7% deficit.
