Interim Prime Minister Ilie Bolojan says that, despite the political crisis 'irresponsibly triggered by the Social Democratic Party (PSD)', the 'consistent' results and meeting commitments have made it possible for Standard & Poor's credit rating agency to affirm their Romania's country rating.

'Consistent results, meeting commitments and firmly keeping direction made it possible for the Standard & Poor's agency to affirm their Romania country rating, despite the irresponsible political crisis triggered by PSD. S&P notes that, in the midst of a deadlock, a government with limited powers managed to keep up trajectory and support an exceptionally high public investment budget, of 8.5% of GDP, with national recovery and resilience fund absorption rates of over 90% for grants and 95% for loans. Had PSD not stymied the pay law, the percentage would have been even higher, with an additional EUR 770 million,' Bolojan said in a social media message posted on Saturday.

Bolojan says that his cabinet has managed to reduce the deficit by RON 27 billion while increasing investments.

'The government I lead has done its duty to the country as best it could. We have narrowed the deficit by almost RON 27 billion from last year, without stopping investments, which reached RON 97 billion for the first eight months, RON 25 billion over last year's level. Public sector staff expenses have decreased by almost RON 9 billion lei in the last 14 months. All this while the interest bill for the loans of the past years has continued to rise. In only eight months, the state paid RON 42 billion in interest, about RON 8.9 billion more than last year.'

Bolojan adds that if the blockage continues, it will be impossible to convince the financiers that Romania is 'reputable.'

'With all these efforts felt by society, for which I want to thank Romanians, although the results are good, if the blockage continues, it will be impossible to convince the financiers that we are reputable. Implicitly, the right direction will be deviated from, and the efforts so far will be wasted. Equally bad would be what S&P calls the risk of suboptimal public policy compromises, adopted at the last minute. The future government must follow the line, maintain the purchase, build exclusively on healthy land and spend only what it has. To us, the objective remains the same: a stable government as soon as possible, but one that guarantees that Romania will not deviate from the right path,' Bolojan said.

Bolojan's reaction comes after Standard & Poor's (S&P) on Friday affirmed its Romania's sovereign rating at BBB-/A-3 (investment grade) and kept a negative outlook.

According to S&P, the negative outlook reflects their view that implementation risks relating to the consolidation of Romania's public finances and the narrowing of its external deficits remain elevated. The outlook also reflects Romania's susceptibility to shifts in investor confidence, due to sizable external financing needs and elevated nonresident holdings of government debt. AGERPRES (RO - editing by: Eusebi Manolache; EN - writing by: Corneliu-Aurelian Colceriu)