Romanian prime minister Victor Ponta is resigning following huge protests after a nightclub fire that killed more than 30 people.
The leader of the ruling Social Democratic Party, Liviu Dragnea, said Ponta would resign later Wednesday after discussions within the ruling coalition.
Some 20,000 people took to the streets of Bucharest Tuesday evening in a spontaneous protest calling for the resignation of Ponta, Interior Minister Gabriel Oprea and a district mayor where the Colectiv nightclub was located.
Bucharest nightclub fire
A heavy metal band’s pyrotechnical show sparked a deadly fire on Friday at a Bucharest nightclub, killing over 30 people and injuring scores of the club’s mostly youthful patrons, officials and witnesses said.
Interior minister Gabriel Oprea initially said an explosion occurred at Colectiv club, located in a basement in a building in downtown Bucharest, a city of 3 million people, but authorities heading the rescue effort later said there had been a fire and no explosion.
Witnesses told Antena 3 TV that there were between 300 to 400 mostly young people at the club, housed in a former factory, and only one exit door when the metal band Goodbye to Gravity was performing and a pyrotechnical show went awry. The station reported that people panicked and rushed for the exit.
