Romania’s most powerful political party ousted its own prime minister on Wednesday, throwing the country, which witnessed giant anticorruption protests this year, into new political turmoil.

The governing party, the Social Democrats, has been embroiled in an intraparty feud, one that now threatens the fragile political stability of the country.

The center-left party won a comfortable victory in December and formed a coalition government. But it angered many Romanians when it proposed legislation that would have essentially pardoned officials imprisoned for bribery and raised the financial threshold above which official misconduct is punishable by prison.

The proposals ignited the largest protests in the country since the fall of Communism in 1989. The government was forced to retreat.