Last year I came up with a scenario on Traian Basescu as PM. It seemed hallucinating. It amazed many people. But it is now visible that the President's actions are in keeping with such an intention. If I am right, Traian Basescu will risk so much that he will set his own mandate on fire. He will sacrifice everything to become a player in the government and take a second step later: the constitutional diminishment of the President's prerogatives and the ensuing enlargement of the PM's prerogatives. This is the Putin pattern, which can be successfully applied on Bucharest democracy. And this way not even the Constitution will be what it used to. The ambiguities in the Constitution can grow much less, for this will be the way to a parliamentary republic at last. This scenario I am now developing will have long term positive consequences. They can't alter because politician Traian Basescu will be the first beneficiary of it, certainly an anti-system character. No matter how much harm he does Romania as a PM with enlarged powers, the advantage of the new constitutional system will matter a lot on long term. If there is such an intention, then it is easier to explain why Vasile Blaga is out of the blue a candidate to take over Bucharest City Hall, although Cotroceni Palace has so far thought him fit for a PM, if the presidential party wins parliamentary elections. Let me just mention he is also the president of the Bucharest organization. So suppose there is such a firm intention. What will Traian Basescu do? Until the parliamentary elections he will do his best to make more and more room for the PDL (Democrat Liberal Party) to take action. He will assail the other parties as often as he can. He will come up with issues for debate so that the PD will act as the most important and authentic party in the opposition. He will be a very active electoral agent with no interest in consequences. The anti-government discourse will escalate, regardless of the disastrous effects on Romania's image, which will be blamed on Calin Popescu Tariceanu anyway. The criminal instrument still in Traian Basescu's hands via Daniel Morar and Laura Codruta Kovesi will be used all the way. More and more criminal cases will be opened, no matter the way they will be approached and with no care about the deteriorating image of Justice. The secret services will be activated. Their structures of second and third importance are also in the President's hands. After the local and parliamentary elections, depending on the success the presidential party counts on, President Traian Basescu will resign. And he will find a populist reason for it, no doubt. Following this line, the president of the Senate - a member of the PDL in Traian Basescu's project - will become an interim President of Romania. And he will appoint a PM. Traian Basescu will be this PM. The second step will mean the PDL's choice for another candidate to presidency. It will probably be Theodor Stolojan. And the third step would be to modify the Constitution. If we use this possibility to analyze the latest political moves of President Basescu and the PDL leaders, we will notice a whole set of strange moves, seemingly failing ones, that can prove successful, but only within this scenario.

Sorin ROSCA STANESCU