Romanian MPs overthrew the pro-European government of Prime Minister Ilie Bolojan on Tuesday, ten months after he took office, following the vote on a motion of censure tabled by the social democrats and the far right.

Published on: 05/05/2026 - 1:47 p.m. Modified on: 05/05/2026 - 1:53 p.m.

The Romanian Parliament voted on Tuesday, May 5, to censure the government, following an alliance between the social democrats of the PSD and the far right to bring down pro-European Prime Minister Ilie Bolojan, whom they accuse of plunging the country into poverty with his austerity policy.

The motion of censure received 281 votes out of the 233 needed to be adopted in a Parliament which has 464 seats. A result which risks plunging the country back into political turmoil, while democratic forces have accused the PSD of playing with fire by helping to legitimize a growing far right.

By allying itself with the Alliance for the Unity of Romanians (AUR), the PSD has made it "a major political actor" whereas it had until then been "ostracized", believes political scientist Costin Ciobanu, interviewed by AFP.

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Contested austerity measures

With 37% favorable opinions in the polls, the AUR already exceeds the PSD in voting intentions, currently the most important force within Parliament since the elections of December 2024, with 130 elected officials.

It is the “end of ten months during which the so-called pro-Europeans delivered nothing other than: taxes, war and poverty”, reacted the boss of the AUR George Simion on X after the vote of censure.

A member of the government coalition, the PSD slammed the door 15 days ago to protest against the austerity measures introduced by Ilie Bolojan in order to reduce the country's budget deficit, the largest in the European Union.

“I think it would be appropriate for Ilie Bolojan to resign from his post now” in order to form “a new government quickly,” said PSD leader Sorin Grindeanu after the vote.

Ilie Bolojan, 57, denounced a “false” and “cynical” motion of censure. “Ten months ago, I accepted this position and I was faced with a difficult situation where I had to do what was right. Not what was popular, but what was necessary,” he added, believing “that the serious problems of the country” would not disappear with him.

His coming to power in June 2025, supported by four pro-European parties including the PSD, had put an end to weeks of negotiations as well as a turbulent political period which had started with the cancellation of the presidential election of November 2024. This had been dominated by an unknown far-right candidate, giving rise to accusations of Russian interference in the electoral campaign of the country which has been at the forefront of NATO since the start of the war in Neighboring Ukraine.

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“Keeping Romania on the right track”

On Monday, pro-European President Nicusor Dan affirmed that the country of 19 million inhabitants which entered the European Union in 2007 would continue its pro-Western orientation, whatever the outcome of the vote. “Political discussions will be difficult, but it is my responsibility as president – ​​and that of the political parties – to keep Romania on the right track,” he told the press.

Costin Ciobanu, a researcher at the University of Aarhus in Denmark, also expects long negotiations to form a new government, with in the end undoubtedly the continuation of the alliance of the same four pro-European parties, but without Ilie Bolojan at their head.

Center-right parties strongly criticized the PSD's decision to join forces with the AUR, accusing it of straying from the pro-European path and wasting time for the country in need of reforms. Some 30 NGOs asked the Party of European Socialists (PES) to exclude it from its ranks if it maintained this alliance.

The PSD, however, assured that it had "no post-motion political agreement" with the far right, their only "common objective" aimed at overthrowing the Bolojan government.

For Costin Ciobanu, the sequence above all illustrates the crisis of "existential anxiety within the Social Democratic Party" which has seen part of its electorate siphoned off by the far right and "does not know what it must do to regain its former position".

The country, whose deficit reached 7.9% of GDP in the fourth quarter of 2025, has been the subject of a European excessive deficit procedure since 2020 and runs the risk of losing European funds.

With AFP

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