The Romanian President, Traian Basescu, has returned two bills to parliament.

Agerpress, the Romanian News Agency, is reporting that President Basescu has vetoed a bill that reduced value added tax (sales tax) on basic foods from 24% to 5% and another bill that exempted people on low-level pensions from income tax.

The twist is that the bills were reportedly passed by mistake. My understanding is that they were reforms proposed by the opposition Social Democratic Party (PSD). Agerpress quotes President Basescu as saying “I’ll send back to Parliament the famous laws mistakenly voted for”. Why the bills were passed when the government has a majority is unclear to me. Anyway, the president has now vetoed them.

In a separate report, the PSD is said to have tabled another vote of no-confidence in the government only three days after a previous no-confidence motion was defeated by 17 votes. (See previous post). This motion relates to the government’s education policy.