A recent comment run on a Financial Times blog depicts the Romanian Government as “at best dysfunctional and at worst incompetent”, while Romanian president Traian Basescu is described as “the country’s bull-in-a-chinashop president”.

The comment, which was recently run under the headline 'Romania’s VAT hike makes for grim GDP reading' on the Beyond BRICS blog, was written by Chris Bryant, the newspaper's correspondent in Eastern Europe.

The Financial Times has been covering the situation in Romania for the last couple of months, during the negotiations with the IMF for a new loan installment, the VAT hike, the salary cuts.

As western Europe basks in a heatwave, the country is mopping up after severe flooding that has left more 20 people dead and caused millions of euros of damage. And even when the flood waters recede, it is dawning on Romanians and international investors alike, that things will not improve in a hurry,” Chris Bryant writes. He goes over the recent changes in the country and the Government representatives' response to the crisis, pointing out the bleak outlook.

“VAT hikes and public sector job losses send European economy into prolonged recession: the rest of the continent must surely be watching,” Bryant concludes in his FT comment.

Read the entire article here.