August 1, 2025 UPDATE (1)

A roundup of local and world news

Newsroom, 01.08.2025, 17:25

PENSIONS – President Nicușor Dan, Prime Minister Ilie Bolojan and Justice Minister Radu Marinescu on Friday discussed the Prime Minister’s proposals to modify the retirement age and pensions for magistrates with representatives of magistrates. The meeting took place in the context of criticism and attacks from the judicial system generated by the changes announced by Prime Minister Bolojan. These include increasing the retirement age for magistrates to 65 years, increasing the length of service from 25 to 35 years and limiting the pension to a maximum of 70% of the net salary, compared to 80% of the gross salary at present. The Prime Minister’s announcement was met with a harsh reaction from the Supreme Council of Justice, which accused the measures of “blatantly violating the principles of the Constitution”. At the same time, four professional associations of magistrates claim that the project is an “irresponsible and disloyal attempt at constitutional change” and rejected the “constant campaign to denigrate and discredit the judicial system”, which aims to “violently and irreversibly destabilize the judiciary”. Also on Friday, Nicușor Dan signed the retirement decrees for 73 magistrates, including the president of the High Court of Cassation and Justice, Corina-Alina Corbu.

PROTEST – Trade unionists in the Romanian education sector protested on Friday in front of the Education Ministry of Education headquarters for the third day in a row, demanding the resignation of Minister Daniel David. In their opinion, the government is causing “an unprecedented crisis in the last 35 years” in the education system, and the measures in the fiscal package for which the government has taken responsibility will also affect the education system. According to union members, the measures that are “severely affecting” education in Romania include the increase in teaching hours by two hours, the merging of hundreds of educational institutions, which, in their opinion, will lead to layoffs of auxiliary teaching and even administrative staff, and the reduction in hourly pay rates. Trade unionists have announced that on September 8, the first day of the new school year, over 30,000 union members will participate in the “Education Rally”. (MI & VP)