Romanian president postpones PM designation until after Christmas

Romanian President Klaus Iohannis on Thursday announced to postpone the designation of a new prime minister until after Christmas.

The announcement caused surprise in local politics and media, as the president should have made the designation on Thursday after his separate consultations on Wednesday and Thursday with the representatives of the parties which gained parliamentary seats in the general elections on December 11, as well as the parliamentary group of minorities.

The Social Democrats and their coalition partner on Wednesday proposed Sevil Shhaideh, a Muslim woman from the ethnic Tatar minority, for the Prime Minister office.

If the nomination is approved by the president and parliament, Shhaideh would be both the first woman and the first Muslim prime minister in the eastern European country where the majority of the population are Orthodox Christians.

The Social Democratic Party and the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats, which together hold majority in parliament, signed a governing protocol on Monday, under which they officially established that they would collaborate both at parliament and government.

In the quadrennial parliamentary elections on Dec. 11, the Social Democrats won more than 45 percent of the votes, while the Alliance of Democrats and Liberals some 6 percent.

source: Xinhua