<p>Romanian Prime Minister Emil Boc resigned on Monday, giving way to mass protests against IMF-backed austerity measures and joining leaders of other European Union states felled by fury at spending cuts.<br /><br /></p>.<p>President Traian Basescu named Boc’s justice minister, Catalin Predoiu, to replace him at the head of a government whose popularity is languishing in opinion polls ahead of a parliamentary election to be held by November at the latest.<br /><br />The International Monetary Fund (IMF), which bailed out Romania in 2009 with a 20 billion euro ($26 billion) loan on condition of deep cuts in government spending, said it did not expect the deal to be affected by Boc’s departure.<br /><br />The cabinet will remain in place under Predoiu in a caretaker capacity until Basescu, who has often used his notionally figurehead post to play a significant role in politics, decides whether to ask Predoiu - or someone else — to form a new government that can secure a majority in parliament.<br /><br />While the leftist Opposition is calling for an early general election, its lack of a majority in the current legislature means that the president, who comes himself from Boc’s centrist Democrat-Liberal Party (PDL), is likely to be able to secure parliamentary backing for his eventual nominee.<br /><br />Whatever happens, the IMF mission chief in Bucharest, Jeffrey Franks, told Reuters: “I see no reason necessarily for this to have a material effect on the aid agreement. We have every expectation the agreement will continue.”<br /><br />Committed at some stage to adopting the euro single currency under the terms of its accession to the EU in 2007, Romania is the 27-nation bloc’s second poorest member and is still struggling with the economic legacy of communist state control.<br /></p>
<p>Romanian Prime Minister Emil Boc resigned on Monday, giving way to mass protests against IMF-backed austerity measures and joining leaders of other European Union states felled by fury at spending cuts.<br /><br /></p>.<p>President Traian Basescu named Boc’s justice minister, Catalin Predoiu, to replace him at the head of a government whose popularity is languishing in opinion polls ahead of a parliamentary election to be held by November at the latest.<br /><br />The International Monetary Fund (IMF), which bailed out Romania in 2009 with a 20 billion euro ($26 billion) loan on condition of deep cuts in government spending, said it did not expect the deal to be affected by Boc’s departure.<br /><br />The cabinet will remain in place under Predoiu in a caretaker capacity until Basescu, who has often used his notionally figurehead post to play a significant role in politics, decides whether to ask Predoiu - or someone else — to form a new government that can secure a majority in parliament.<br /><br />While the leftist Opposition is calling for an early general election, its lack of a majority in the current legislature means that the president, who comes himself from Boc’s centrist Democrat-Liberal Party (PDL), is likely to be able to secure parliamentary backing for his eventual nominee.<br /><br />Whatever happens, the IMF mission chief in Bucharest, Jeffrey Franks, told Reuters: “I see no reason necessarily for this to have a material effect on the aid agreement. We have every expectation the agreement will continue.”<br /><br />Committed at some stage to adopting the euro single currency under the terms of its accession to the EU in 2007, Romania is the 27-nation bloc’s second poorest member and is still struggling with the economic legacy of communist state control.<br /></p>