The relationship between President Klaus Iohannis’ National Liberal Party (PNL) and the Social Democrats (PSD) headed by Prime Minister Marcel Ciolacu is gradually deteriorating ahead of the presidential and parliamentary elections.

Iohannis has complained about Romania’s allocation of European commissioner, while another issue is that the Social Democrats are reportedly not supporting a bill drafted by the Liberals that would allow Iohannis to run in the parliamentary elections with the Senate speaker’s position in mind.

Romania was given a “social portfolio” with a still unclear definition, instead of an economic portfolio, Iohannis said, pointing to Ciolacu as responsible for the negotiations held with the European Commission on the matter.

"The negotiation for this position was done at prime ministerial level and I think it's better to ask the prime minister how he told us all he was going to get an economic portfolio and he got a social portfolio which still needs to be clarified what does it contain,” said Iohannis in response to a question asked by journalists regarding the portfolio obtained by Roxana Minzatu.

DG EMPL is responsible for EU policy on employment, social affairs, skills, labour mobility and the related EU funding programmes, according to the European Commission.

It is not clear what Minzatu will do in Brussels because virtually all the areas entrusted to her for management belong to the exclusive competence of the states, Ziarul Financiar pointed out at the time of the appointment.