Project financed through SEE grants 2009-2014,
As part of the ONG Fund in Romania
Is the National Anticorruption Directorate (DNA) creating politicized cases? The supremacy of the Social Democratic Party (PSD) is proportional with its domination over local administration
Does Traian Băsescu use the DNA as an instrument against his political enemies, especially the PSD? The idea has shown up quite frequently for some time in public debates. Clean Romania tried to find out the answer and looked through all the relevant corruption dossiers that feature politicians, dossiers built by DNA prosecutors in the mandate of Laura Codruţa Kovesi (May 2013- April 2014). We took into account prosecutions, arrests, and cases of people called to court for trial. Even though the PSD leads in these categories quite easily, the overall weight of the result compared to the number of local elected officials shows that all the big parties are corrupted and investigated by the DNA. An investigation of someone close to Train Băsescu, as the press has alluded to, would completely balance the situation.
Following the analysis, there were 33 dossiers where party members were accused, and the party distribution is rather balanced, even though the PSD has the lead.
Therefore, the PSD is first with 13 dossiers (approximately 40%), followed by the National Liberal Party (PNL) – 7 dossiers (21%), the Democratic Liberal Party (PDL) – 6 dossiers (18%), the Democratic Union of Hungarians in Romania (UDMR) – 2 dossiers, the Popular Movement Party (PMP) – 2 dossiers, the Conservative Party (PC) – 2 dossiers, Independents – 1 dossier.
The Social Liberal Union (USL) and its satellites have gained after the 2012 local elections no less than 37 County Councils, out of the total 41, only 4 (2+2) belonging to UDMR and PDL. Therefore, since 2012, USL controls 90% of Romania’s counties, this meaning it has full administrative control and full access to local resources. However, Basescu’s party at the time, PDL, controlled only 15% of city halls. From this we can conclude that the eight dossiers that PDL+PMP have, that represent almost 25% of the total, account for at least 10% more DNA dossiers, compared to the party’s local representation, contradicting thus the myth of the alleged protection ensured by Basescu.
We must admit however that in the cases of PSD and PNL those incriminated are well-known politicians, while for PDL those accused are from the lower ends of the party. At the PSD, almost half of the dossiers are old, being started at the time when the DNA was led by Daniel Morar, and Kovesi just finalized them and called people to trial.
One of the explanations of the first place held by the PSD in criminal dossiers could consist of the fact that this party has the highest number of local elected officials (almost 50% of the county council presidents, 40% of the county capital city halls), PSD and its allies also have a majority in Parliament.
The Presidents of county councils and the mayors of big cities are given consistent budgets, their opinion matters heavily when it comes to naming the leaders of local or decentralized institutions, and in Romania the temptation to corrupt or let yourself be corrupted is big. If the number of politicians sent to court is reported to the absolute number of politicians, the supremacy of the PSD disappears and the party statistically aligns itself with PNL and PDL.
The situation is balanced when it comes to sentences. In the mandate of Laura Kovesi, courts have sentenced Adrian Năstase (PSD), Relu Fenechiu (PNL), Monica Iacob Ridzi and Emilian Frâncu (PDL), Dan Voiculescu and Gheorghe Coman (PC), Antonie Solomon (last time at PP-DD), Dan Diaconescu (PP-DD), Gheorghe Neţoiu (UNPR).
The complete list of important corruption cases carried out by the DNAcan be found here:
To the Culture Minister, Kelemen Hunor. A call for a Commission of Historic Monuments without demolishers and cyanide aficionados
On the 26th of March 2014, the Ministry of Culture has published on its website the proposals to modify the Rules concerning the organization and functioning of the National Committee of Historic Monuments (CNMI), approved (modified) just a year ago, through the Order of the culture minister no. 2173 on the 28th of March 2013. The main change concerns line (5) of article 9, which will have the following content: ”(5) In order to avoid conflicts of interest, Commission Members, during their time at the Commission, along with members of special sections of this commission and those of zonal commissions cannot attend meetings during which documents that said members have helped create will be analysed”. This modification comes after a number of public criticisms that have highlighted the interdiction (incompatibility) from last year’s Rulebook that claimed that the CNMI should have members whose projects are under analysis and approval, etc. This aspect has generated a drastic reduction of the overall selection area of CNMI members, because the majority of experts in the domain are active, the entire situation leading to a less professionalized Commission. According to the new regulations (cited above), the interdiction (which aims to avoid conflict of interest) allows for experts to be part CNMI, only that they will be barred from attending meetings that concern their own projects.
The list of cyanide aficionados found by Mihai Goțiu can be accessed here: