Corruption in Romania

In denial

Jul 3rd 2008 | BRUSSELS AND BUCHAREST
From The Economist print edition

The European Union conceals Romania’s backsliding on corruption

HOW bad is corruption in Romania? Somebody well-placed to answer is Willem de Pauw, a Belgian prosecutor who is a veteran European Union adviser on the matter. Last November he wrote a report that concludes: “instead of progress in the fight against high-level corruption, Romania is regressing on all fronts…if the Romanian anti-corruption effort keeps evaporating at the present pace, in an estimated six months’ time Romania will be back where it was in 2003.”

This report has not been published (it is now available here). The European Commission’s report in February was a lot softer. “In its first year…Romania has continued to make efforts to remedy weaknesses that would otherwise prevent an effective application of EU laws, policies and programmes. However, in key areas such as the fight against high-level corruption, convincing results have not yet been demonstrated.”

That falls far short of admitting that Romania’s authorities are wilfully failing to co-operate. Some of Mr de Pauw’s most striking examples did not appear in the official report either, or were buried in footnotes. Mr de Pauw confirms his authorship but refers inquiries about it to the commission. Officials say he was consulted on the issue. Their February report, they add, was a “factual update”, not an assessment of Romania’s progress. That will come in a fuller report later this month.

It would be encouraging if this included some of Mr de Pauw’s points. One hot example is the cases that courts have sent back to prosecutors since Romania’s constitutional court struck down an anti-sleaze law. Mr de Pauw’s report said that “basically all” high-level corruption trials had been rebuffed by courts, which it was “statistically impossible to attribute [to] the coincidental occurrence of procedural mistakes in individual cases. Other factors than legal-procedural considerations have clearly played a major role.” He added that “the Romanian judiciary and/or legal system appears…unable to function properly when it comes to applying the rule of law against high-level corruption. Indeed, more than five years after the start of Romania’s anti-corruption drive, the public is still waiting for one single case of high-level corruption to reach a verdict.”

Events also support Mr de Pauw’s warning that Romania could soon regress to the level of 2003. Take the case of Adrian Nastase, a former prime minister charged with several counts of corruption and bribery. He has now been exonerated by the parliamentary committee on legal affairs. A lobby group, the Initiative for a Clean Justice, complains that “we are witnessing the transformation of parliamentarians into judges and of the judicial committee into an extraordinary court.” A full parliamentary vote on the committee’s recommendation has been postponed until after the EU’s July report. But Mr Nastase and his supporters are already considering a presidential bid in 2009.

In retrospect, the EU relied too much on individual politicians to back Romania’s anti-corruption drive, notably Monica Macovei, a much-admired justice minister. She was fired soon after Romania joined the EU in January 2007. Membership made the political elites feel they were off the hook. Mr de Pauw offers a bleak verdict. “Many of the measures that were presented, before accession, to be instrumental in the fight against corruption, have been deliberately blunted by parliament or the government immediately after accession…all major pending trials concerning high-level corruption, started just before accession and only after many years of hesitation, have now been aborted and are, most probably, definitely abandoned for all practical purposes.” He also cites the weakening of the role of the National Integrity Agency, meant to limit politicians’ conflicts of interests and verify their assets, and also amendments to the penal code before parliament that will “fatally affect” the investigation of corruption.

All this, he says, shows “the intense resistance of practically the whole political class of Romania against the anti-corruption effort”. Mid-level Eurocrats, as well as some foreign diplomats in Bucharest, agree. The problem is that countries such as France pushed to get Romania into the EU early for their own reasons, whether financial or geopolitical. And the political pressure may now be to cover up, not expose, the problem. If the EU’s July report on Romania is as anodyne as the previous one, suspicions will only grow.

Romanian government wary of social protection plans

BUCHAREST, July 1 (Reuters) - Romania's ruling centrists dismissed opposition proposals to cushion the impact of soaring food and energy costs on those hardest hit, saying on Tuesday such moves would just hurt the economy more.

Like other countries in eastern Europe, Romania is struggling to ease poverty while combating pressures stemming from global price rises and rampant consumer spending that have taken Romanian inflation as high as 8.6 percent this year.

Earlier on Tuesday, the main political parties met to discuss a policy response and the leftist Social Democrat Party (PSD) proposed a cut in value added tax on staple foods and in taxes on fuel for farmers.

The Democrat-Liberal Party (PD-L) of President Traian Basescu asked the government to speed up pension hikes and subsidise household energy bills. Both parties demanded a rise in minimum wages.

But Finance and Economy Minister Varujan Vosganian said some of the plans could hurt efforts to protect economic stability.

"I hope political parties will reassess their proposals, taking into account inflationary risks," he told reporters.

He reiterated the government's plans to keep a budget deficit target of 2.3 percent of gross domestic product this year and to focus spending on long-term investment in infrastructure.

Many economists have said the budget plan is already too large and that domestic demand has bloated Romania's current account deficit and foreign debt, leaving the economy acutely vulnerable to swings in global investor sentiment.

But with a parliamentary election due late in the year, the government is likely to come under increased pressure to raise welfare spending.

"We do not want social inequality to deepen," Emil Boc, head of the PD-L, said after the Tuesday meeting, held by president Basescu.

The ruling PNL is struggling in opinion polls as many Romanians turn to the economic security promised by the left with a rising sense that the poor have been left behind by market reforms.

The leftists and the centrist PD-L opposition are also under pressure to boost popularity ratings as they are likely to vie for a top spot in the national vote.

The pro-business PNL has a track record of bowing to pressure for higher spending. Last year, it sided with the leftists to double state pensions over two years, even as rating agencies warned against the move.

So far, Prime Minister Calin Tariceanu has been reluctant to go through with hikes in minimum wages, which the government had proposed should be introduced in the middle of this year provided the economy was on track.

Rape victim, 11, allowed abortion in Romania

By ALISON MUTLER

BUCHAREST, Romania (AP) — The government ruled Thursday that an 11-year-old rape victim would be allowed to have an abortion in Romania, dismissing the opposition of 20 church groups.

Pro-life Christian Orthodox groups had threatened to press charges if the girl was allowed to have an abortion in Romania since it would be beyond the 14 week legal limit. The girl is 21 weeks pregnant.

The stance of the church groups was in contrast to the Romanian Orthodox Church's official view that the decision should be left to the girl's family. The parents initially wanted to travel to a country where it would be legal.

"We are talking about ... the rights of this child who was subjected to rape and incest," said Theodora Bertzi, a Labor Ministry official and who was sitting on a committee, made up of government officials and experts, who ruled on the case.

The girl's pregnancy was revealed earlier this month when her parents took her to a doctor because she appeared sick. She told doctors she had been raped by her 19-year-old uncle, who has since disappeared.

The case has bitterly split the medical community, child rights groups and the public.

In a statement, the church groups offered "material, spiritual and psychological help" to the child's impoverished family, adding they would also rear the child in a church institution if the family was unable to care for it.

But splits were apparent even within the church.

Constantin Stoica, spokesman for the Romanian Orthodox Church, to which more than 80 percent of Romanians belong, said Wednesday it was "an exceptional situation which must be treated in an exceptional manner and the family is the only one to take this decision."

He said the church considers abortion a crime, but this belief applies to normal circumstances and not to incest or rape.

Romanian rape victim, 11, to have UK abortion

By Sarah Radford and agencies

telegraph.co.uk

A 11-year-old rape victim has been flown to the UK for an abortion after she was refused a termination in her native Romania.

The girl was just 10 years old when she was allegedly raped twice by a 19-year-old man while staying with his family at a village in Neamt in east of the country.

The girl’s pregnancy was not discovered until 17 weeks – too late for an abortion under Romanian law, which allows terminations only up until the 14th week of pregnancy, and then only if the mother's life is endangered or the foetus is deformed.

Her family’s battle to secure a termination has since divided the country.

Her father said: "He told my daughter that we would beat her if we found out what had happened, and that we would abandon her, so she kept quiet.

"We only found out four weeks ago after she complained of stomach pains. Her mother took her to the hospital on June 2 - and we discovered she was pregnant.

"I wanted to kill him but he has gone on the run - no-one knows where he is."

The family had assumed an abortion would be easy to secure because of their daughter’s age.

But the shattered family were told that their daughter's pregnancy was too far advanced for a termination under local law.

"She was just a child herself and one who had been raped and betrayed.

"How could anyone expect her to go through with the pregnancy and have the baby?" explained one family friend.

The issue has bitterly divided the medical community, child rights groups and the public in Romania.

Two medical panels have so far examined the girl who is now 21 weeks pregnant.

The first found in favour of an abortion – but the second rejected an operation describing the pregnancy as "natural".

The second panel said: "Having examined the girl, the panel observes that the pregnancy is proceeding naturally and therefore that termination should not be imposed."

Doctors ignored the fact that the pregnancy was the product of a rape.

"The fact that the pregnancy stemmed from rape was not taken into account by the panel, for two reasons," explained Vica Todosiciuc, head of the Cuza Voda maternity section in the north eastern city of Iasi.

"One, because rape has not been proven. And two, because the penal code does not allow for any exceptions.

"This was a very difficult decision for the doctors to make.

"They searched for a medical reason which would allow them to authorise a termination, but none was found," he added.

Even Romania's Orthodox Church – the dominant faith in the country – has given its tacit blessing to an abortion.

It described the case as "an exceptional situation".

"It must be treated in an exceptional manner and the family is the only one to take this decision," said Church spokesman Constantin Stoica.

In the latest move the Romanian Health Minister Eugen Nicolaescu announced on Wednesday that an inter-ministerial panel would be formed to decide whether she can have an abortion in Romania.

But the family has taken up the offer of a trip to the UK for the termination at a clinic in London.

The cost of the procedure and the airfare is being met by a wealthy benefactor in London who made direct contact with her family.

The girl's mother said: "Panel after panel, meeting after meeting. In the meantime, my poor girl gets more and more terrified.

"The last thing she needs is more talk. Thank God for the Romanian woman in Britain who has come to her rescue," she added.

In Britain abortion is legal up to 24 weeks if two doctors decide that the risk to a woman's physical or mental health will be greater if she continues with the pregnancy than if she ends it.

20 Romanian church groups urge 11-year-old pregnant rape victim not to abort

The Canadian Press

BUCHAREST, Romania — Twenty church groups on Thursday urged a government committee not to allow an 11-year-old girl raped by her uncle to travel to Britain for an abortion.

The pro-life Christian Orthodox groups also threatened to press charges if the girl were allowed to have a termination in Romania on exceptional grounds.

Their position was in contrast with the official stand of the Romanian Orthodox Church, which said the decision should be left to the girl's family.

A government committee is to decide on Friday whether the girl can go to Britain for an abortion or must continue the pregnancy.

The girl's pregnancy only became known earlier this month when her parents took her to a doctor because she appeared unwell.

She told doctors she had been raped by her 19-year-old uncle, who has since disappeared.

She is now 20 weeks pregnant. The legal limit for abortions in Romania is 14 weeks. Abortions can be carried out later only to save the life of the mother.

In Britain an abortion is legal up to 24 weeks if two doctors decide that the risk to a woman's physical or mental health will be greater if she continues with the pregnancy than if she ends it.

The case has bitterly split the medical community, child rights groups and the public.

In a statement, the church groups offered "material, spiritual and psychological help" to the child's impoverished family, adding they would also raise the child in a church institution if the family was unable to care for it.

But splits were apparent even within the church.

Constantin Stoica, spokesman for the Romanian Orthodox Church, to which more than 80 per cent of Romanians belong, said Wednesday it was "an exceptional situation which must be treated in an exceptional manner and the family is the only one to take this decision."

He said the church considers abortion a crime, but this belief applies to normal circumstances and not to incest or rape.

The National Child Protection Authority has said the girl should be allowed to have an abortion because she is already traumatized by the experience of rape and pregnancy.

The National Doctors Council, however, said that the rights of the fetus should be considered and the pregnancy should go ahead. They argued that abortion laws should not be liberalized further.

Gov't committee rules that 11-year-old pregnant rape victim can have abortion

The Associated Press

Thursday, June 26, 2008

BUCHAREST, Romania: A government committee dismissed the opposition of 20 church groups and ruled Thursday that an 11-year-old rape victim would be allowed to have an abortion in Romania.

Pro-life Christian Orthodox groups had threatened to press charges if the girl was allowed to have a termination in Romania on exceptional grounds since it would be beyond the 14 week legal limit for abortions.

The parents of the girl wanted to travel to Britain where it would be legal for the girl, who is 21 weeks pregnant, to have an abortion.

The stance of the church groups was in contrast to the Romanian Orthodox Church's official view which was the decision should be left to the girl's family.

A committee of government officials and experts set up this week to rule on the controversy said late Thursday that the girl could have an abortion in Romania.

"We are talking about ... the rights of this child who was subjected to rape and incest," said Theodora Bertzi, a Labor Ministry official and who was sitting on the committee. The committee will give its full ruling Friday.

The girl's pregnancy only became known earlier this month when her parents took her to a doctor because she appeared unwell. She told doctors she had been raped by her 19-year-old uncle, who has since disappeared.

Abortions can be carried out later than 14 weeks in Romania but only to save the life of the mother.

In Britain an abortion is legal up to 24 weeks if two doctors decide that the risk to a woman's physical or mental health will be greater if she continues with the pregnancy than if she ends it.

The case has bitterly split the medical community, children's rights groups and the public.

In a statement, the church groups offered "material, spiritual and psychological help" to the child's impoverished family, adding they would also raise the child in a church institution if the family was unable to care for it.

But splits were apparent even within the church.

Constantin Stoica, spokesman for the Romanian Orthodox Church, to which more than 80 percent of Romanians belong, said Wednesday it was "an exceptional situation which must be treated in an exceptional manner and the family is the only one to take this decision."

He said the church considers abortion a crime, but this belief applies to normal circumstances and not to incest or rape.

The National Child Protection Authority has said the girl should be allowed to have an abortion because she is already traumatized by the experience of rape and pregnancy.

The National Doctors Council, however, said that the rights of the fetus should be considered and the pregnancy should go ahead. They argued that abortion laws should not be liberalized further.

Equal time for happy news on Romania TV, radio

BUCHAREST (AFP) — Upbeat news would have to make up half of all newscasts on all of Romania's radio and television stations, under legislation adopted unanimously Wednesday in the senate.

"News programmes on TV and radio shall contain, in the same proportion, news with positive and negative themes," states the legislation, which is going to President Traian Basescu for adoption.

The measure is the idea of two senators -- one from the governing National Liberal Party, the other from the far-right Great Romania party -- who bemoan the "irreversible effect" of negative news "on the health and life of people".

Its aim, they said, is to "improve the general climate and to offer to the public the chance to have balanced perceptions on daily life, mentally and emotionally".

It would be left to the national audiovisual council in Romania -- an EU member state where the media was tightly controlled until the 1989 collapse of communism -- to judge what is "positive" and "negative".

Less than impressed is the council itself, along with journalists who hope the legislation will not be promulgated.

"News is news," said council chairman Rasvan Popescu, quoted by the Mediafax news agency.

"It is neither positive or negative. It simply reflects reality. I don't believe that the introduction of such a quantitative criteria can work. Events cannot be programmed, nor can minds."

Romania Urges EU on Roma Inclusion

19 June 2008 Bucharest _ The European Commission must devise a strategy on how to integrate Europe’s Roma into mainstream society, Romania’s President Traian Basescu urges.

He made the statement at a press conference before leaving to attend Thursday’s European Council summit in Brussels.

Basescu pointed out that Romania asked the European Commission in December last year that it should present a report on the matter during this summit but the Commission has now postponed this to July 2.

“Romania will insist that conclusions of the European Council summit must refer to this matter,” Basescu said.

He emphasised that Romania is trying to sustain a balanced approach in this issue.

“Migration which is not under control would lead to an extreme social phenomenon but on the other hand, migration must continue as a way to assist European Union development,” Basescu added.

In recent weeks, diplomatic ties between Romania and Italy have come under pressure as Rome’s new government has tightened immigration policies. Read more: http://balkaninsight.com/en/main/news/10704

The move came in the wake of reports of crimes being committed by immigrants, including a Romanian Roma who allegedly beat to death the wife of an Italian naval commander on the outskirts of Rome.

The Italian government has made it easier for local authorities to expel European Union citizens considered dangerous. But some observers say the move was mainly targeted at up to a million Romanians who live in Italy.

It has also required an obligatory minimal income for EU citizens living in Italy and tightened restrictions for the reunification of immigrants' families.

These policies have come under fire from human rights activists and politicians in some countries, especially in Romania.

Relations between Romania and Italy and the attitude towards Romanians in Italy must not be endangered by isolated cases, Romania’s Prime Minister Calin Popescu Tariceanu pointed out.

Romania village elects dead mayor

BBC News

Romanian villagers have voted to re-elect a dead man as their mayor, to prevent his living rival winning.

Neculai Ivascu - who led Voinesti for almost two decades - died from a liver disease on Sunday, too late to cancel the contest.

The village's loyal residents still gave him 23 more votes than his rival, Gheorghe Dobrescu of the ruling National Liberal Party.

"I know he died, but I don't want change," one villager told Romanian TV.

In a controversial decision, the electoral commission declared the runner-up and rival Mr Dobrescu the winner.

Neculai Ivascu's party, the opposition Social Democrat Party, has said it will contest the decision.

Some villagers have also called for a fresh vote.

INSIGHT: Realignment in Romania

Sofia Echo

The local elections on June 1 provided the much-awaited reassessment of Romania’s political scene, setting the stage for parliamentary polls in autumn and offering a hint on the composition and trends in the country’s next legislature. With something tangible at stake, unlike last year’s European Parliament elections (Brussels is still very much a terra incognita that is of little concern to the average voter), the polls gave the closest estimate of the political parties’ standing with the electorate.

The main winner was the Democrat-Liberal party (PDL), which has made backing president Traian Basescu to the hilt its only political doctrine. Basescu, of course, is the former leader of the party, having resigned in order to become president, as he is required to do under the constitution. As usually happens in such circumstances in the Balkans, however, he continues to steer the party, barely bothering to hide the fact.

PDL received 28.4 per cent of all votes, pipping ahead of the Social Democrats (PSD), who won 28.2 per cent of the vote, final data from the electoral authorities showed. In terms of county councillors, both parties won 425 seats.

Despite the parity, PDL is entitled to view the results as an undoubted success. Four years ago, it took the combined efforts of the PDL, then named the Democratic Party, and the National-Liberals (PNL), to match the might of the ruling PSD in local polls.

Since then, the alliance between the Democrats and PNL managed to narrowly defeat PSD at both parliamentary and presidential polls, taking the reins of government, only for relations to sour and escalate into a war of words between Basescu and PNL prime minister Calin Popescu Tariceanu. The president’s charisma – coupled with Tariceanu’s conspicuous lack of it – has prompted a sizeable faction of the PNL to splinter away, forming the short-lived Liberal-Democrat party, which later merged with the Democrats to form PDL. The clash between Basescu, who elicits strong feelings among supporters and detractors, and Tariceanu, has resulted in PDL leaving the cabinet, with PNL securing support for its minority government from the unlikeliest of sources – PSD.

PNL itself did not do too badly for a party in power, winning 18.7 per cent of the vote and 279 councillor seats, while their coalition partners, the Democratic Union of Hungarians in Romania (abbreviated as UDMR in Romanian), secured 5.4 per cent and 89 councillor seats.

Yet the scars of the confrontation between president and prime minister, dubbed the “war of the palaces” by Romanian media – the Cotroceni palace being the residence of the president and Victoria palace the building that houses the cabinet – run deep. Deep enough so that reconciliation between the two former centre-right allies, PDL and PNL, looks unlikely.

Tariceanu, never the most popular figure even in the ranks of his own party, is another winner to emerge from the local elections. He now looks set to keep leadership of the party even after the inevitable defeat at the parliamentary elections, given the disastrous showing of Ludovic Orban in the mayoral elections in Bucharest, who finished fourth with only 12.1 per cent of the vote. Orban, the incumbent transport minister and brother of Romania’s representative on the European Commission, Leonard Orban, has been the main challenger to Tariceanu’s leadership of the party and one of the prime minister’s biggest critics inside PNL.

Tariceanu’s desire to cling to power, which he made obvious in July 2005 when he made a U-turn on his decision to resign and call snap elections, fearing that Basescu would nominate some other PNL official as prime minister designate after the vote, marked the start of acrimonious clashes with Basescu, a strong proponent of early polls. To keep PNL in government, Tariceanu is said to be considering a coalition with the Social Democrats after the parliamentary polls. This would have been an unthinkable development until recently, considering that PNL was one of the major political parties banned in the aftermath of World War 2 by the Communist party, whose successor is PSD, and the post-1989 enmity between the two parties.

Already in some county councils PSD and PNL have joined forces to deny PDL the upper hand and the Social Democrats have hinted they might not be averse to extending co-operation to a nationwide level. PSD lower chamber floor leader Viorel Hrebenciuc has gone on record as saying that PSD could drop its demands to abolish the flat tax rate, a key election promise of the Democrats and Liberals before the 2004 polls that was passed and went into force in 2005 to secure PNL’s support after this autumn’s elections.

Tariceanu’s other potential rivals in the party, including his predecessor as party leader Theodor Stolojan, left PNL for PDL, which faces its own realignment after the local elections, political columnist Silviu Sergiu wrote in the Evenimentul Zilei daily. The old Democrat guard has done a less-than-stellar job, with former minister Radu Berceanu defeated in Dolj county and another former minister, Vasile Blaga, uncertain of winning the Bucharest mayoral race on June 15. Should Blaga lose against Sorin Oprescu, a former PSD heavyweight twice defeated in run-offs, who now runs as an independent, it would be the first time that rightist parties lose control of the Bucharest mayor post since 1989.

It would also give more weight to Stolojan and his faction of PNL defectors in PDL, since their showing at the polls was the exact opposite – former agriculture minister and one-time candidate for PNL leadership Gheorghe Flutur won the county council chairperson vote in Suceava county and his cousin Catalin Flutur is the new mayor of Botosani, both of them defeating well-entrenched PSD local leaders in the process, Sergiu wrote.

Neither party has much time left to change public perceptions – as soon as summer is over, campaigning will kick into high gear, but, in the past, Romanian political parties have not managed to reverse trends in the short period of time between local and parliamentary elections, though positive momentum can bring out sympathisers to the polling stations to boost turnover and overall results.

The three major parties can rest assured that they will have a strong presence in Romania’s bicameral parliament come winter, but for the three smaller parties in the current legislature, the local elections sounded alarm bells concerning their future tenure in parliament. UDMR, ever flirting with the five-percent electoral threshold, is once again threatened by the spectre of life out of parliament, though if previous elections are any indication, it should do just enough to be represented in parliament.

The situation is much worse for the nationalist Greater Romania party (abbreviated as PRM in Romanian). The party lost ground across the country and now has councillors only in selected counties, a drastic change from the nationwide presence it won in 2004 and a far cry from the heady days of 2000, when PRM leader Corneliu Vadim Tudor shocked the country by receiving enough votes to appear in the presidential run-off, even though he was soundly defeated. For the opportunistic Conservative party, which has repeatedly switched allegiances in recent years, the future looks even grimmer.

PRM and the Conservatives, as well as other parties now outside parliament, have a single hope, and a slim one at that, to win parliamentary seats. Even with Romania’s electoral code change, which mixes plurality voting with proportional representation, they would need to win six seats in the lower chamber and five in the upper chamber to render the five-percent threshold irrelevant. Unfortunately for all those parties, they lack the strong candidates to do so.

With PRM in danger of disappearing from Romania’s political stage, the next legislature could have the smallest number of parties of any post-communist parliament – just four. Yet that is unlikely to make political calculations after the elections any easier and Romania could once again find itself without the strong government needed to push ahead with European Union-mandated reforms, especially in the justice and home affairs department, where the country still faces potential EU sanctions. Far from settling Romania’s politics, the local elections’ realignments could spell more uncertainty for the country.

Security Tightened for Romania Local Poll

BalkanInsight.com

11 June 2008 Bucharest _ Romania's Prime Minister has asked the Interior Minister to assure better security at the second round of local elections on Sunday.

Calin Popescu Tariceanu's move came after the first round of voting on June 1 was cancelled in a village near Bucharest, because overcrowding at a polling station meant some villagers were apparently unable to vote.

The Interior Minister, Cristian David, assured the Government that more police would be sent to polling stations but also to patrol the streets.

He said that in every county there would be mobile groups of security personnel who would patrol and resolve in less than an hour claims for possible electoral fraud.

”I think this is the most efficient way to assure security at the polls stations as it is hard to prove fraud after they had been committed,” David pointed out.

He said that the number of voting cabins would be increased to prevent any more cases of overcrowding.

In voting for the June 1 poll, David said the authorities had proof that voters were given € 300 to vote for a candidate in Stefanesti village outside Bucharest. Read more: http://balkaninsight.com/en/main/news/10649

Hundreds of people, mostly Roma, crowded outside the local polling station, so many voters were unable to vote.

David said there will be an investigation, claiming there was “real evidence that the vote was influenced.”
The elections in Stefanesti will be repeated on Sunday.

Over 600 incidents were registered in the electoral campaign and at the first round of voting, police say.

1,474 mayors will be elected on Sunday in the second round of the election.

Former Romania Minister in Bribes Probe

BalkanInsight.com

09 June 2008 Bucharest _ Romania's former Agriculture Minister, Decebal Traian Remes, is being investigated for taking bribes, the National Anti-Corruption Department says.

He is accused of giving preferential treatment to a private company for winning a key tender.

Remes is alleged to have received in return € 15,000, a luxury car worth € 65,000 and food products.

Another former Agriculture Minister, Ioan Muresan, is also being investigated in the same case for complicity with Remes.

President Traian Basescu pointed out during a visit by his Finnish counterpart that Romania had not completed all the tasks regarding high level corruption.

In October 2007, Decebal Traian Remes resigned from government.

His move came as public television broadcast hidden camera footage of Remes meeting a former official, from whom he had allegedly received around €15,500 on behalf of a businessman. Read more: http://balkaninsight.com/en/main/news/6026

It has been claimed that the businessman in question wanted, in return, preferential treatment in securing a tender for a public institution.

Prosecutors have accused Remes of taking the money, and a promise of goods worth €455, from former Agriculture Minister Ioan Muresan who was acting as an intermediary for the local businessman.

According to Transparency International’s corruption perception index, despite some progress made since 2004, Romania remains the most corrupt country in the European Union.

Romania announces local election results

Romania's Central Electoral Bureau announced late on Friday the results of the local elections held June 1, widely regarded as a litmus test of parliamentary elections later this year.

During the local elections, voters chose thousands of county council members and town mayors.

In the county council elections, the pro-president Democratic Liberal Party (PDL) won 425 seats nationwide, while the main opposition Social Democratic Party (PSD) gained the same number of seats. The ruling National Liberal Party (PNL) obtained 279 seats.

The PNL, led by Prime Minister Calin Popescu-Tariceanu, is running against the centrist PDL, supported by President Traian Basescu, and against the leftist PSD led by former President Ion Iliescu.

Since Romania joined the European Union on Jan. 1, 2007, President Basescu and Prime Minister Tariceanu have competed fiercely with each other due to policy differences and personal preferences.

In the elections on June 1, a candidate must obtain 50 percent plus one vote to secure a town mayor position.

Among the town mayor positions secured, the PSD won 661, while the PDL gained 472 and the PNL 355. If no candidate gets enough votes for a town mayor position in the first round, the two frontrunners will compete in a runoff on June 15.

Source: Xinhua

Romania and Bulgaria must act now to end the corruption at its heart

Times Online

In the next month Romania must prove to the European Commission that it is making some progress against the corruption that has run throughout its politics and public life. It must show that it is dragging its courts and judges farther from the communist era and closer to 21st-century Europe.

The task of convincing Brussels falls on Romania's new Justice Minister, Catalin Marian Predoiu, who faces scepticism, frustration and even anger from Brussels. Since Romania and Bulgaria joined the EU in January 2007 the Commission's reports have noted in alarm that the pair, let in before they were really ready, have lost all incentive to improve, and that in corruption (and in Bulgaria's case, murder by organised crime), their standards are unacceptable. Officials say that if the July reports are bad, sanctions could follow.

Predoiu, a 39-year-old commercial lawyer, takes on a brief that others have failed to master. In Romania's struggles to haul itself out of the era of Nicolae Ceausescu, the dictator executed in 1989, the Justice Ministry has been at the heart of the storm. One of Predoiu's predecessors, Monica Macovei, became a hero in Brussels and at home for her pursuit of corrupt high-level officials and politicians.

Then she was sacked, by the Prime Minister, Calin Popescu-Tariceanu, as part of his feud with President Traian Basescu. Her first successor, Tudor Chiuariu, resigned in December, under investigation for corruption (which he denied). The Defence Minister held the baton as a stopgap, and now Mr Predoiu takes it up. “It is fair to say that reforms lost speed,” he said yesterday in London. “But we have a new attitude now: we really want to solve this problem.” He believes he has good accounts of progress on three of the four benchmarks set by the Commission: on a new legal framework (writing the new civil and criminal codes; setting up a National Agency for Integrity; and reforming local bureaucracy to squeeze out small-scale corruption.

On this, he is particularly convincing. Driving licence applications are now made online, removing the face-to-face contact that leads to bribes. But it remains to be seen whether the new Inspector for Integrity, with powers to investigate the income and assets of those in public life, actually has bite, or proves to be another example of Romania professing change but failing to deliver.

The new legal framework faces a worse problem: the need for approval by parliament, itself in disarray, with factional feuding. That leads to the worst problem impeding Romania's compliance: the clause of the constitution that says that parliament must approve the bringing of all cases against former or current members of parliament. There are three cases waiting for such approval, including charges against the former Prime Minister, Adrian Nastase; eight others identified by prosecutors have not yet been submitted to parliament.

This is the single reason why Romania has failed to prosecute high-level officials, the fourth of the Commission's benchmarks. As Predoiu points out, “we have hundreds of cases” at lower levels that have been sent to court. He agrees, in his personal opinion, that it is unfortunate that the constitution includes this clause, but given that it does, “as Justice Minister, I have no way to intervene”. But progress on this front is perhaps the only way to satisfy Romania's growing number of critics.

Romania Opposition Parties Near Alliance

BalkanInsight.com

04 June 2008 Bucharest _ Representatives from Romania’s Social Democratic Party and the Conservative Party have started talks on an alliance for autumn’s general election.

The alliance will probably be registered at a court on Friday, the leaders of the parties decided as they met on Wednesday.

They will meet again at the end of the month to discuss the electoral programme and to define the leading structure of the alliance, the Conservative Party’s President Daniela Popa said.

The two parties will also support each other’s candidates for the second round of local elections in June 15.

The first decision for cooperation between the two parties was taken in April. Read more: http://balkaninsight.com/en/main/news/9450

The leader of the Social Democrats, Mircea Geoana, added that his party would field almost 900 candidates, while 90 would come from the Conservative Party.

Geoana pointed out that if the results of the two parties in the local elections were added up, the alliance would have won the polls.

So the alliance has real chances to win the parliamentary elections this autumn, Geoana claimed.

The Social Democrats got 28.22 percent of the votes to the county councils at the local elections that took place on Sunday, while the Conservatives did not exceed 4 percent.

The ruling Democratic Liberal Party, the Social Democrats’ opponent, received 28.38 percent of votes.

The Social Democrats are said to be interested in this alliance because the Conservative Party controls two of the most important television stations in Romania, Antena 1 and Antena 3.

This is the second time the two parties have cooperated for legislative elections.

In 2004, the Social Democrats and the Humanist Party (the former name for the Conservative Party) formed an alliance to win the Presidency of the country and the majority in the Parliament.

In December 2004, after loosing the Presidential elections, the Conservatives deserted the Social Democrats and joined the victorious Liberal National Party - Democratic Party Alliance and the Union of Hungarians in Romania, forming the new Government.

After two years, the Conservatives stepped out of the Executive.

Romania’s Big Parties Draw in Local Polls

03 June 2008 Bucharest _ Romania's two biggest parties have finished neck-and-neck after nationwide local elections.

Preliminary results released Tuesday showed the opposition Social Democratic Party, PSD and President Traian Basescu's ruling Democratic Liberal Party, PDL, both gained about 28 percent of the vote.

The poll is being scrutinised as a guide to the likely outcome of parliamentary elections to be held later this year.

The result of Sunday's vote is a boost to the embattled left-wing opposition because senior party members, including former Prime Minister Adrian Nastase, are under investigation for corruption. The party was in power between 2000 and 2004.

About 18 million people were eligible to vote for 3,200 mayors, 40,000 members of district councils and 41 chairmen of district councils.

The vote however was marred by a low voter turnout, with less than 50 percent of eligible voters going to the polls, five percentage points below turnout in 2004.

Bucharest saw very low turnout, with only 31 percent of eligible voters casting ballots, despite the political and financial stakes probably being the highest nationwide.

Observers view holding the mayorship in the capital as a potential springboard to the presidency, as it was for Basescu, who went from mayor to president in 2004.

Nineteen candidates competed for the post. PDL candidate Vasile Blaga, who received 30.9 percent of the vote and independent candidate Sorin Oprescu, who received 30.7 percent, will meet in a runoff on June 15.

Oprescu's independent bid sparked controversy from the very beginning, when he quit the PSD after failing to earn its nomination.

After his resignation, Oprescu failed to collect enough petition signatures to run as an independent. In the end, the Appeals Court ruled that he could run. The press later found that some of his alleged petition signers had never heard of Oprescu or were infants.

In the other major cities, with the exception of Constanta and Cluj-Napoca, no mayoral candidate won in the first round.

A series of irregularities and violent incidents occurred in smaller towns, where some politicians allegedly tried to buy votes. Read more: http://balkaninsight.com/en/main/news/10649

Low Turnout in Romania’s Local Elections

BalkanInsight.com

02 June 2008 Bucharest _ Romanians headed to the polls Sunday to choose 3,200 mayors of towns, 41 chairmen of district councils and more than 40,000 council members, but the vote was hit by a low turnout.

Turnout in urban areas was just 40.77 percent while 61.26 percent of registered voters cast their ballots in rural areas.

The most interesting result came in the battle for the mayor of Bucharest.

According to exit polls, the candidate of the Democratic Liberal Party, PDL, Vasile Blaga, and the independent Sorin Oprescu are facing a tight race, both securing around 30 percent of votes.

In an area such as Bucharest where no candidate won 50 percent + 1 of the votes, a second round will be held on June 15. A total of 19 candidates are vying for mayor of Bucharest.

Oprescu was a member of the Social Democratic Party, PSD, before the electoral campaign but the PSD choose not to have him to represent the party in the elections even though opinion polls suggested he had the best chance of winning.

Oprescu decided to run independenly and quit the PSD.

His opponent, Blaga is of the PDL, the party of Romania’s President Traian Basescu, who was Bucharest mayor before running for the national presidency.

The runoff vote for Bucharest will be interesting as the capital is seen traditionally as a stronghold for the PDL but the PSD, the Liberal National Party and several smaller parties have rallied around Oprescu to help him win the second round.

In Bucharest, only 30 percent of voters turned out to cast their ballots.

Sunday’s local elections were the first time Romanians have voted directly for a representative, rather than their preferred political party, which would otherwise select representatives based on prepared lists.

Mayors have been elected like this up to now but the presidents of the County Councils were previously chosen by members of the councils and not always according to the votes gathered by the parties.

The move is part of electoral reforms being implemented before the parliamentary vote this autumn.

Another change introduced in Sunday's vote is that representatives of the Romanian Orthodox Church are competing for seats in the district councils, following approval of the Holy Synod.

There are about 18 million registered voters in Romania.

Romania Prepares for Local Elections

BalkanInsight.com

29 May 2008 Bucharest _ Romania is set to hold local elections on Sunday in what has been a very quiet electoral campaign.

Nevertheless Sunday’s local elections will be the first time Romanians have voted directly for a representative, rather than their preferred political party, which would otherwise select representatives based on prepared lists.

Mayors have been elected like this up to now but the presidents of the County Councils were previously chosen by members of the councils and not always according to the votes gathered by the parties.

So in some cases, the political colour of the County Council president was not representative of the majority of the people’s choice.

The electoral campaign has also been seemingly quiet while President Traian Basescu previously denounced the campaign as fake, arguing rival candidates were not holding debates with each other because of backroom power-sharing deals. Read more: http://balkaninsight.com/en/main/news/9909

Most candidates have concentrated their political speeches on the fight against corruption, while others have been giving away food and money to elderly voters in Romania’s poor rural areas.

One candidate even distributed mobile phones.

In Bucharest, though, there was a surprise as the few polls in this campaign revealed that an independent candidate would win.

Romania last held elections in November 2007 for choosing the representatives to the European Parliament.

Only a quarter of registered Romanian voters actually cast their ballots then.

Romania Politicians ‘Influencing Justice’

BalkanInsight.com

20 May 2008 Bucharest _ Romania’s President claims some politicians have pleaded with him to interfere in justice on their behalf.

Traian Basescu claimed that some of them had even come to his home and office to ask him to interfere for resolving their run-ins with the law.

He refused to give names or to specify the parties represented by those politicians, saying that it is not important, as he never took any further action.

”Please, don’t act like to I don’t know that these things are happening,” the President told the presenter of the television show.

Basescu pointed out that now the whole political class had turned against him because he refused to talk to people who had asked him to interfere in the justice system on their behalf.

Political analysts suggest Basescu simply used the remarks as a publicity stunt as the country gears up for local elections and Basescu seeks to secure votes for his Democratic Liberal Party.

“He must have given names and he should have gone to the prosecutors to denounce those politicians,” Cristian Tudor Popescu, an analyst said.

At the beginning of March, Basescu claimed that the country's politicians are continuing to pressure the judicial system. Read more: http://balkaninsight.com/en/main/news/8447

Speaking to press, Basescu said that politicians had been so infuriated by their inability to control the judiciary that they had adopted laws protecting them against investigation.

As an example, Basecu cited laws adopted last year which had served only to block the higher levels of the fight against corruption and protect those disrespecting the country's banking laws.

The judicial system is also threatened, added Basescu, by groups within the mass media that are mainly controlled by politicians.

In a survey published by the country's General Prosecutor's Office, 40% of respondents said that they thought prosecutors weren't doing their job efficiently, while 43% said they had little trust in the Romanian judicial system.

Sex and elephants woo voters ahead of Romania polls

Reuters

From parading an elephant through the streets to wrapping a condom on a finger or posing as Jesus, Romanian politicians are finding new ways to woo voters ahead of municipal elections on June 1.

In the Black Sea port of Constanta, a bulky candidate for mayor, nicknamed "the elephant," publicized his campaign by walking the animal through the town centre.

"It eats peas," the candidate Victor Manea said, poking fun at the current mayor of Constanta, whose last name, Mazare, means peas in Romanian.

The election for thousands of city mayors and county council members is an important gauge of the popularity of Romania's centrist government ahead of a parliamentary election this year. Hence the eye-catching stunts.

A candidate from the western city of Arad has printed banners showing himself sitting behind a long table, together with 11 colleagues, in a depiction of the Last Supper. His message is he "believes" in his team.

Banners in central Romania display images of a finger with a condom wrapped around it. The candidate for city hall in Bistrita, Gelu Dragan, hopes to show he will protect voters against ever-present corruption.

And in what a Romanian blog called "eggvertising," a candidate for the Navodari sea resort stamped his name on eggs to be sold in supermarkets. Their sell-by date is set for a week before a potential run-off on June 15.

Many voters, angry about Romania's dilapidated infrastructure and poor public services, are not impressed.

"I feel harassed," said Ileana Zamfir-Berca, a 49-year-old accountant from Bucharest.

"These people will do anything to get into power but just because they are walking an elephant doesn't mean they'll repair roads."

(Reporting by Marius Zaharia; Editing by Keith Weir)