Prime Minister Florin Citu: We need pension system reform

Prime Minister Florin Citu said on Tuesday that reforms are needed in the pension system, as they are already presented in the fiscal-budgetary strategy and will be transferred to the National Recovery and Resilience Plan (PNRR), and the Government "repairs what Social Democratic Party (PSD) has ruined in recent years."

Asked about the elimination of the early retirement pension, Citu said: "You take fragments from the discussions. We do not have a broad plan presented so far. There was no discussion about the early retirement or other pensions. The reform of the pension system is discussed, and the objective for this system is sustainability".

"We know very well that not only in Romania but at EU level there is a problem with the sustainability of the pension system, which, in a few years - in 10, 15 years - could have a sustainability problem. Thus, we need these reforms, there is nothing new, these reforms are already presented in the fiscal-budgetary strategy that is public, in the convergence program, which is also public and will be transferred to the PNRR," the prime minister added, before the meeting of the National Liberal Party (PNL) leadership.

Citu mentioned that "the Government is repairing what the PSD has damaged in recent years".

"There are country recommendations in the 2019-2020 convergence plan for previous governments, what this government is doing today is repairing what the PSD has ruined in recent years, but also in the past year, when no reforms have been made. That is what this reform program is doing today," the prime minister specified, asked if these reforms were recommended by the European Commission.

On Friday, PSD chairman Marcel Ciolacu accused the Citu Government of having pledged to the European Commission not to increase pensions, to abolish early retirement and to increase the retirement age.