Liberals and Democrats call for urgent Alliance meeting

“We have waited for the Liberal Democratic Party as the current holder of the Alliance's chairmanship to convene either an extended meeting of the Alliance or of its Board, but no reactions have followed so far”, stated Democrat leader Marian Lupu on Wednesday. Marian Lupu said Vlad Filat's party was obliged to convene an urgent meeting of the ruling Alliance for European Integration especially after the Cabinet's expected adoption of the Budget Bill on Saturday was postponed until an unspecified date. Lupu said that the PLDM has so far ignored the Democrats' and the Liberals' request to come together. When asked about the reasons for the postponement, Marian Lupu said he had some idea of what those might be, but refused to reveal his suppositions. Talking about the 2011 Budget Bill, the Democrat leader recalled that, according to the rules, it was supposed to be adopted no later than at the end of last year. “This has already become an extremely pressing issue because, according to the law, all the procedural time limits have been exceeded. The draft 2011 Budget Law was supposed to be submitted to Parliament until October 1 last year. The fiscal policy and the tax revenue targets should have been determined even earlier, at the end of June 2010”, said Marian Lupu. Lupu said the Alliance needed to discuss the Budget Bill before submitting it to Parliament. “When a Budget Bill is debated in Parliament, usually a confrontation appears between the government on one side and the opposition on the other. All the issues ought to be coordinate internally before the Bill is presented in the legislature. It would be very great to discuss and coordinate it, and then send it to the Government and Parliament”, said Marian Lupu. On Saturday, Prime Minister Vlad Filat told the Cabinet members when they gathered for the meeting that the postponement of the Budget Bill's adoption was not related to the budget process. He said that certain issues appeared that needed to be discussed in another setting.