The PȚB's stand within the opposition became a cause for disputes among the other parties. Beginning in March, its envoys began talks of a fusion with Mihalache's PȚ. This move was resisted by Pelivan especially, who believed that political life also required decentralization. The talks also involved the PND, but Iorga rejected the close alliance between the PȚB and Constantin Stere, whom Iorga regarded as a wartime traitor. After excluding Andrei Scobioală, Halippa had managed to have Stere run as a PȚB candidate, but not a PȚB member, in the by-elections of Soroca. During the early months of 1921, the opposition collapsed into factions. Iorga, the Assembly President, refused to validate Stere's deputy mandate—meeting opprobrium from an ad-hoc coalition of PȚB-ists, Laborites and Socialists. The issue was taken up by a November 1920 Congress, which voted to continue with the FDNS, but also vetoed any merger.