Romanian Prime Minister Ludovic Orban resigned on December 7, after the National Liberal Party (PNL) he heads underperformed in the general election — though the party still has a strong chance of remaining the senior ruling party.

Commenting on the preliminary outcome of the December 6 general election, President Klaus Iohannis said that there is no clear winner, but a centre-right majority coalition is clearly emerging. 

According to the still preliminary results, the centre-left Social Democratic Party (PSD) got nearly 30% of the votes, the PNL just over 25% and fellow centre-right party USR-Plus 15%. 

Among the smaller parties, the Alliance for the Union of Romanians (AUR), a newly formed party of nationalist orientation, got 8-9% of the votes, followed by the Democratic Alliance of Hungarians in Romania (UDMR) with 6%. It is uncertain whether the Popular November Party (PMP) led by former President Traian Basescu met the 5% threshold to enter the parliament, as the votes from the diaspora have not yet been included in the preliminary results. Should the PMP make it into the parliament, it would consolidate the centre-right coalition.

The party that received the largest number of votes in the general election, the PSD, insists Iohannis should accept the nomination of its PM candidate Alexandru Rafila. But it is unclear to what extent PSD president Marcel Ciolacu believes a Social Democrat PM candidate might actually form a majority coalition to support him. The distribution of seats clearly favours a centre-right ruling coalition. 

Iohannis, who reportedly suggested that Orban resign, has already appointed Minister of Defence Bogdan Ciuca as acting prime minister.

Iohannis announced that “not too late” he would initiate negotiations with all the parliamentary parties in order to identify a ruling coalition.

A possible interpretation of Orban’s rather unexpected resignation is that the step back is aimed at smoothing his party’s negotiations with the reformist USR-Plus bloc on the formation of a centre-right coalition.

Dan Barna, the president of Save Romania Union (USR), unveiled a document laying the ground for the negotiation of a "decent" centre-right coalition of USR-Plus with the PNL and UDMR.

USR-Plus is ready to rule together with the PNL and UDMR, which has "become indispensable", the USR-Plus co-president Dacian Ciolos declared in his turn. He is the reformist bloc’s candidate for the PM seat.

The document unveiled by Barna and Ciolos at a joint press conference includes the requirements strongly advocated by the reformist bloc in the last few years, such as eliminating special pensions, dismantling the special section for investigating magistrates (SIIJ), banning convicted people from holding public office, two-ballot local elections and trimming down the number of MPs to 300.

Ciolos also said it was essential "to support a credible candidate for prime minister”, a candidate capable of bringing together right-wing reformist forces.

"This must be discussed in the negotiations with the parties and the president, and not on television. From our point of view, a new beginning is needed," Ciolos said — implying that a new term for Orban is unlikely.