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Romania: New Government Sworn in
Romanian Prime Minister Adrian Nastase and his ministers took oath on Thursday evening in front of President Ion Iliescu at Cotroceni Presidential Palace.
Iliescu said after the Nastase Cabinet took oath that the task of the current government would not be easy. It has the duty to find "the most adequate ways, not painful in social terms" to take the country out of the "deep recession it has been in for about four years."
The Romanian Parliament gave a confidence vote earlier on the day to the Nastase government by 314 fors and 145 cons of a total of 459 votes.
The 50-year-old prime minister said after the vote that the Party of Social Democracy of Romania would govern for Romanians in the next four years and not for "one, two, three parties or a coalition," stressing that the new executive wanted to give confidence to the people who believe that Romania could be again " a land of welfare, a country of dignity and a credible state."
A real growth of the gross domestic product and improved living standards for the Romanians are the main goals contained in the new Cabinet's ruling program. Under the program, the government will take action for re-starting the economy growth, fight poverty and unemployment, restore the authority of the state and its institutions, cut red tape, fight corruption and crime and speed up the process of Romania's integration into the European Union and NATO.
The Nastase government is the eighth after the December 1989 Event and the seventh endorsed by the parliament. The current executive, that has 27 members, is the most numerous of the seven post-December 1989 governments endorsed by the parliament. It is for the first time after 1989 that five women are ministers.
The average age of the government members is 49 years, and almost half of them have a doctor's degree.
The new government will hold its first meeting on Friday.
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