Dragu to request Joint Standing Bureaus clarify September 9 plenum leadership: Cannot keep passing buck

The President of the Senate, Anca Dragu, said she will notify the Joint Standing Bureaus to clarify the situation of the leadership of the joint session of Parliament on September 9, during which the censure motion was read, agerpres reports.

Asked if she will notify the Joint Standing Bureaus regarding the joint session being led by Florin Roman, the leader of the National Liberal Party (PNL) group in the Chamber of Deputies to whom the attributions of the Chamber's Speaker had been delegated, Dragu said: "We must see the abuse that Mr. Roman committed at that session. His colleagues say that he was the one abused, but that doesn't mean it was so (...) Yes. We will request the clarification of the situation, firstly, and we cannot let this situation remain in the air like this, we cannot keep passing the buck. We are responsible people, we are MPs, we have a Constitution we must respect."

"I should have led that session of the Joint Plenum. Until September 9 there were 13 joint sessions - seven sessions were led by Speaker [Ludovic] Orban and six by me (...) Where's the alternation? The argument brought by Mr. Roman is a superficial one," said, on Tuesday, Dragu, at the Senate.

The Chamber of Deputies and Senate met, on September 9, in Joint Session to present the censure motion submitted by the Save Romania Union - Party of Liberty, Unity and Solidarity (USR PLUS) and the Alliance for the Union of Romanians (AUR).

At the start of the session, Florin Roman mentioned that the meetings of the Joint Plenum are led alternatively by the chairs of the two Chambers.

The leader of the USR deputies, Ionut Mosteanu, requested Deputy Speaker of the Chamber of Deputies Florin Roman allow the President of the Senate, Anca Dragu, lead the session. Roman closed the session and left the Parliament's rostrum, pressured by MPs from USR PLUS and AUR.

After Roman announced he is concluding the session, the leadership of the session was taken over by the President of the Senate, Anca Dragu.