On Monday, Romania’s President Traian Basescu formally received the formal agreement from all political parties in the Parliament as regarding the National Anti-corruption Authority bill.
The President is to return the law draft to the Chambers for a new vote. In spite of this last moment ‘agreement’, since spring 2005, the MPs have actively sabotaged the anti-corruption authority and continue to do so. Yesterday, the judiciary commission in the Chamber denied the anti-corruption prosecutor’s demand for permission to search an apartment owned by the former PM Adrian Nastase as he is charged in a bribery case. Thus, again, the MPs sent a controversial message to the people – i.e. that they would like to stay above the law.
The history of the National Anti-corruption Prosecutor (PNA) is short but complex. PNA came to existence according to a Govt Urgency Ordinance in 2002 (i.e. OUG 43/2002), under a Cabinet led by Social-Democrat PM Adrian Nastase. In the meantime, a modified Romania’s Constitution came into force on Oct 22, 2003. Nastase’s Cabinet repeatedly made changes to the anti-corruption legal framework (i.e. OUG 102/2003 and OUG 103/2004), while PNA managed to solve only two cases involving high officials.
It is to be underlined that according to all these legal texts, the National Anti-corruption Prosecutor had the right to indict MPs and members of the Government.
Meanwhile, in the autumn of 2004, the Social-Democrats (PSD) eventually lost the general polls, as Traian Basescu was elected as Romania’s President and he managed to impose a Cabinet led by the Liberal-Democrat centre-right alliance.
The new justice minister, Monica Macovei had undertaken a significant step forward in fighting corruption by issuing, on March 3 2005, a new Govt Urgency Ordinance regarding the declaration of financial interests (OUG 14/2005) – this bill eventually becoming law as the Parliament passed it on May 16 2005. The ‘big problem’ with this new ‘declaration of interests’ was that it required from the MPs and Ministers a complex and a more detailed statement. That is why, in April 2005, some MPs in opposition (led by Corneliu Vadim Tudor, the boss of ‘Greater Romania Party’ - PRM) asked the Constitutional Court to rule upon the constitutionality of the OUG 103/2004 – the anti-corruption bill issued by the former Social-Democrat PM, Adrian Nastase was never disputed since then. What really happened -- The PRM petition to the Constitutional Court, from April 2005, argued that the National Anti-corruption Prosecutor has no constitutional right to indict PMs. But then why the petitioners did not act immediately after the bill was issued? The answer is obvious: the new bill regarding the declaration of financial interests, promoted by the new Justice Minister Monica Macovei, would had caused serious harm for some high ranking MPs, now in opposition – those who acquired big fortunes in the last 15 years.
Thus, the law regarding the declaration of financial interests was published on May 26 2005 and, on May 31 2005, the Constitutional Court published its Decision no. 235, ruling that the National Anti-corruption Prosecutor has no constitutional right to indict members of the parliament, while the only General Prosecutor had this right.
From these above, it stands clear that this Constitutional Court ruling was meant to prevent the anti-corruption authority to press charges against MPs such as Adrian Nastase & Co. However the ruling displayed no surprise, since one easily might see that most of Constitutional Court judges were either members of the Social Democrat party (PSD), ore were close to PSD.
Therefore, even if the new declaration of financial interests came into force, the Minister of Justice could not use it against allegedly corrupted MPs. And this is the context within Monica Macovei issued, on Oct 7 2005, the Govt Urgency Ordinance 134/2005 trying to restore the anti-corruption prosecutor powers when dealing with members of the parliament. The bill was easily passed by the Lower Chamber but, since the National Anti-corruption Department begun to build cases against several MPs, the Senate immediately provided a negative vote, on Feb 9 2006, by arguing that as the DNA chief was to be appointed by the Minister of Justice the institution would act under political pressure. At this stage, Romania’s president Basescu intervened and had talks with the parliamentary parties over this matter.
Last Monday, an agreed upon solution emerged and slightly modified anti-corruption bill is to be sent back in the Parliament.
One might simply conclude that the Romanian Parliament managed to postpone for almost one year any attempt to fight top corruption cases involving MPs, even if EU officials repeatedly asked Romanian authorities to tackle the issue as soon as possible in order not to put in danger the country’s bid for EU accession in 2007.
Having these in mind, it is highly possible that President Basescu might have been learned the lesson and he would try a maybe more radical way of reforming the country’s political environment – i.e. the setting up a ‘clean presidential party’ with a view to early general elections this year.
The bare facts show he has no other choices in the case he really intends to swipe the endemic corruption of the post-Communist oligarchy.
And it is highly probable that public also shares this view. The latest opinion poll shows a 63 percent of those trusting Resident Basescu. The ruling Liberal-Democrat alliance is in front with 42 percent, while Social-Democrats lost 3 points, going down to 25 percent. Moreover, some 64 percent of those interviewed think that President Basescu is right when he says that illegitimate interest groups are influencing the Cabinet.
Romania Report
No comments:
Post a Comment