Financiarul

Candidate of the National Liberal Party (PNL) to Presidency Crin Antonescu vows that the inter-ethnic dialogue will become one of the important items during his mandate, in case he wins the presidential elections.

In a press release remitted on Wednesday to Covasna press, Crin Antonescu specified that Romanians in Covasna and Harghita (center, counties where ethnic Hungarians are predominant – editor’s note) should not be treated as a minority, the same as the Hungarian ethnics should not be treated as a minority, or a majority, because “we are all Romania’s citizens”.

“Almost everywhere people are confronted with the same issues and they all want a better life and more respect, irrespective of their ethnicity. I do not like and did not like to talk in terms of ethnicity”, said PNL candidate.
Antonescu said he was in favor of finding out a more efficient method of teaching Romanian to national minority classes, saying it is in the interest of all citizens to know the state’s official language.

“Children of Hungarian ethnics could learn Romanian in the first school years as a foreign language. Sincerely, I do not see what is the problem. By a foreign language I understand any other language than the maternal one, clearly”, said Antonescu, noting that he is in disagreement with Traian Base scu on this topic. Antonescu added that he will never stake on speculating eventual ethnic tensions and will condemn every move to this end.

As for PNL relation with the Democratic Union of Hungarians in Romania (UDMR) Antonescu stressed this “was and is one of political collaboration”. “We deal with UDMR as with any political formation.
We try to discover the common points and surmount divergences. If I can come up with a joke, UDMR is the sole political formation which has not planned in certain moments, in the past 20 years, to destroy PNL or other historical parties. For us, the liberals, who have been through a lot, this is an important thing”, said Antonescu.