President Basescu Invites BNR Governor Isarescu “Into Arena”

05.27.2011 ZF English

Romanian President Traian Basescu yesterday launched a direct attack against central bank governor Mugur Isarescu, saying that, before lecturing on how to run a country, he should come out into the arena because, says the head of state, it is one thing “to talk on TV’ and another to “take responsibility at the top”.

Basescu did not specifically say the governor's name, but the President's acerbic declarations come just one day after Isarescu had criticized, in Premier Boc's presence, what he called the "inconsistencies" of the Government in adopting economic policies, which, according to him, prolonged the recession.

In a cutting tone, the president yesterday renewed an invitation he has made several times in the last few years, to people in the central bank, and to top-ranking business execs to come take government positions and stop trying to act like know-it-alls from the sidelines.

"The BNR keeps acting as a teacher. Ask any of them if they want to be finance minister or prime minister. A lot of them prefer to act like all-knowing teachers. I can list about ten smart people, journalists quote them as if they were quoting from the Bible, but let them become finance minister! It's very easy to talk," Basescu said.

The central bank's answer was straightforward, and came from the governor's advisor Adrian Vasilescu: "The BNR governor was also prime minister (between 1999 and 2000), when Basescu was transport minister."