Politics

PSD leader Victor Ponta attacked the education minister and urged him to resign: “Funeriu is plainly incapable of managing Education reform.” Liberals too will file Wednesday a regular motion against the minister.
Attending the debate on the new Education Law yesterday at Parliament Palace, President Traian Basescu said this moment of crisis is favourable to changes, because “education is key to improving Romanians’ living standards” and only with competent people can we prevent entering another crisis.” (...) No change was made in the education system and everything that’s been done so far was patching up the education system. If there is anybody who claims to be the reformer of the system in the last 20 years since the Revolution, I want to invite that person to look at the results,” Basescu said, quoted by Mediafax. During debates, President Basescu added Romania has one of the weakest education systems in Europe and the weakest in the European Union. He said provisions of the new draft law on education do not touch school autonomy, while making it clear that autonomy of interest groups within universities cannot be accepted.

The World Bank Country Director, Central European and Baltic Countries Peter Harrold, reaffirmed the institution’s support for Romania’s reform agenda and expressed optimism with the process outcome, after a visit to our country. “This is about how the Government can deliver better services to the population,” said Harrold. “It is critically important to continue with structural reforms in order to ensure fiscal sustainability and economic growth in Romania”, he said in a press release. The Romanian counterparts agreed the World Bank partnership with Romania must be continued and discussed the scope for collaboration in a number of areas in the coming years. These priority areas will be determined by the World Bank in close cooperation with the Government and other partners, notably the EU, and might include administrative reforms and monitoring of sector policies, social sector reforms for inclusive growth, and support for the key agricultural sector. Involvement in other pillars mentioned by the national reform plan and by the EU 2020 strategy (for example knowledge economy, or regional development) will also be considered, Peter Harrold said. These are areas where the World Bank has significant experience and accumulated knowledge. An increased engagement of the Bank with regional and local governments and a gradual phasing-in of World Bank fee based services for the Romanian Government, particularly in relation to increasing Romania’s capacity of absorbing EU funds, were also envisaged. The World Bank has provided support to Romania in the context of the financial crisis, as part of a package of support from the IMF, EU and the Bank. The first Development Policy Loan (DPL) for Euro 300 MLN, which is part of a series of three totaling Euro 1 bln, was disbursed on October 2009.

Asesoft International will provide the Romanian Gendarmerie with an e-learning platform deployed to the 62 units of the institutions situated in a total of 53 areas. The value of the contract awarded on March 15 is RON 19.12 mln including VAT, Mediafax informs. Only one other bidder participated, apart from Asesoft International. The new project is for the development of training courses consisting of a total of 690 four-hour training sessions broken down into seven different specializations on five levels of difficulty, addressing specific themes such as induction, career development (change of specialisation, specialisation, improvement, promotion in rank), foreign languages and other lines of training (psychology, project management). The programme will be financed through the European Regional Development Fund.