Pro Romania MPs won't vote on new offshore law proposal

Pro Romania MPs will not vote on a new proposal for the offshore law, party leader Victor Ponta said on Monday. 

"As far as the offshore law is concerned, we will not vote on any new proposal. It is a subject we have been working on since 2013 and Romania could stand to gain very much from here in terms of investments, of revenues to the state budget. Yet the subject of energy independence was hijacked for personal interests, for Dragnea to get himself a picture with Trump, or in hopes that Trump could help Dragnea and Valcov get away without serving jail time, but as you can see Trump is unable to help his own aides out of trouble, I strongly doubt it that he is looking to help Dragnea and Valcov to not land in jail. It is very clear that in the current formula Romania won't have investments in the next period and again it's very obvious that when we will need gas we'll import it from Russia. I don't know if Dragnea and Valcov are intently playing into Russia's hands, probably not, but we will not vote on any proposals made by Liviu Dragnea to the offshore law," Ponta told a press conference. 

In another thread, speaking about the new pension law, Ponta said lawmakers of his formation are backing the adoption of a regulation to increase pensions, but which should come into force next year, not in 2021. 

"If the necessary money is in place, as the Minister of Finance and the Labor Minister assure us, then we will put forth an amendment to the pension law so that all the raises come into effect on January 1, 2019. If money is short, there is no point in adopting the pension law and lie to the people that it will come into force in 2021. If the money isn't there in 2019, it won't be in 2020 either. My duty is to tell the people the truth," Victor Ponta added. 

The offshore bill that cleared Parliament at the end of the previous session was sent back to Parliament for review by President Klaus Iohannis.