PLUS leader Ciolos says him or USR leader Barna will run for presidency

Chairman of PLUS (Freedom, Unity and Solidarity Party) Dacian Ciolos on Monday stated that either him or the leader of the USR (Save Romania Union), Dan Barna, will "definitely" run for presidency, while evoking the result obtained by the USR-PLUS Alliance in the elections to the European Parliament. Ciolos told Romania TV private television broadcaster about the collaboration within the Alliance 2020 USR PLUS. "We got up from the table a couple of hours ago. We had our first day of discussions about making a political alliance, to follow the electoral alliance we had in the elections to the European Parliament. We are still in touch, we work together and we shall walk together till the end, beyond any insinuations," he said. Asked whether him or the USR leader, Dan Barna, will run in the presidential elections, Ciolos said: "One of us will definitely will. We will make a team anyway, in any form." Ciolos said that, given the result obtained in the elections to the European Parliament of May 26, the USR PLUS Alliance will have a candidate in the presidential elections. "We scored more than 22 per cent in the latest elections. We are one of the three political forces of this country. Do you see any reason why we shouldn't have a candidate, in the context in which we are one of the main political forces in the country? Would there be any explanation that we could give to someone asking why we don't have a candidate when we had this result? So it's natural. It has nothing to do with other candidacies from the other parties. Each party has the right to present its candidacy. We will discuss about our political programmes in the campaign," specified the PLUS leader. AGERPRES (RO - author: Oana Ghita, editor: Antonia Nita; EN - author: Cristina Zaharia, editor: Adina Panaitescu)