The strike took place on February 10 before the congress of local government representatives, where Romanian Prime Minister Ilie Bolojan is scheduled to speak, and lasted two hours.
“The strike is organized by the National Union of SCOR, it is the result of an internal vote within our structures. Except for a few abstentions, there is unanimity in its organization, so the action is taking place in all administrations where we have trade union organizations – 1370 town halls. We expect that solidarity actions will also take place in town halls that are not part of our union,” SCOR chairman Dan Cârlan told Agerpres news agency.
During the protest, Prime Minister Ilie Bolhogan participated in a discussion on “Administrative Reform, Public Expenditure Reduction Policies and Their Impact on Communes in Romania”, organized by the Association of Romanian Communes.
Earlier, he said that if the local self-government bodies fail to operate with less staff and lower costs, the issue of administrative-territorial reorganization is likely to come up.
“We can no longer transfer large sums to local governments. Romanians should be aware of the situation: in Europe, all the revenues that city governments collect – local taxes, property taxes – usually cover all their expenses; in Romania, all the local revenue covers only a quarter of the expenses. So this is a big problem. We are the country with the highest expenditures from the state budget for local needs,” explained the government’s position, Ilie Bolhogan.
