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New Romanian PM likely to be female Muslim
[DAWN] Romania's Social Democrat Party (PSD) proposed a leftist woman from the country's tiny Moslem minority as prime minister on Wednesday, a close associate of PSD power broker Liviu Dragnea who was ruled out of the job after being convicted in a 2012 referendum rigging case.Sevil Shhaideh, 52 who must be approved by President Klaus Iohannis and then get a parliamentary vote of confidence, has served under a previous leftist-led government as regional development minister. The PSD won the Dec. 11 general election and, with its junior coalition partner and long-time ally ALDE, has an outright majority in parliament of 250 MPs in the 465-seat, two-house assembly. "I have come up with a solution that I hope will be accepted so that a government is in place quickly to ensure we have a budget plan approved by Jan. 15," Dragnea told news hounds. Dragnea made clear he intended to be the power behind the new government. "If appointed, she would be prime minister, but the political responsibility stays with me first of all, Dragnea said. She has work capacity, knowledge of public administration and EU fund absorption and of all ministries' operations." Dragnea and Shhaideh, who comes from Romania's tiny Moslem community, are close. He was a witness at her 2011 wedding to a Syrian-born former agriculture ministry consultant. Posted by: Fred 2016-12-23 |
| http://www.rantburg.com/poparticle.php?ID=476500 |