Romanian President Calls On Parliament To Adopt Pension Bill ASAP

Basescu says in the letter that the adoption of the pension bill by the Parliament would be an important step for Romania towards meeting the commitments undertaken with its international partners.

Basescu also says the adoption of the pension bill represents "a condition of the International Monetary Fund for Romania's bailout loan and also a prerequisite for the adoption, within the legal deadline, of the state budget and the social security budget for 2011.

The pension bill was sent back to Parliament for reexamination by President Basescu, who requested lawmakers lower the set retirement age for women to 63 instead of 65. However, opposition social democrats, liberals and conservatives in the Senate's standing bureau proposed the labor committee should draw up its reports within three weeks.

The reexamination and final adoption of the bill, which aims to overhaul the country's public pension system and which the International Monetary Fund has set as a condition for Romania's bailout loan, could be delayed for a long time, as the Constitution does not set timeframe obliging the Parliament to reexamine a bill. Romania was supposed to have adopted the pension bill by the end of September.

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