Transparency International Sets Crosshairs On Romanian Anticorruption Dept

At the same time, the organization requested a presentation of the indicators used by the Ministry of Justice in determining the efficiency of the institution’s actions, a presentation that would indicate the Anticorruption Department has done its duty and carried out its mission.

 

Last week, Romania’s justice minister Catalin Predoiu said he would soon forward a new proposal for the headship of the National Anticorruption Department (DNA), after the High Council of Magistrates (CSM) rejected the nomination of Monica Serbanescu last summer. 

 

Predoiu said it is not a good time for legislative amendments in what concerns the appointment procedure of prosecutors and he will most likely nominate the current chief anticorruption prosecutor, Daniel Morar, at the helm of the department.

 

Early September 2008, the prosecutors’ section of the High Council of Magistrates rejected four to three votes the appointment of Serbanescu in the position of chief anticorruption prosecutor. Under the law, the justice minister gets a consultative vote from the Magistrates' Council and then sends the appointment procedure to the head of state, who makes the final decision.

 

On September 18, 2008, the European Commission spokesman Mark Gray said the Commission’s stance on Romania’s procedures for the appointment and removal of chief prosecutors had been constant and firmly stated in the country report on July 23, 2008.

 

On September 16, 2008, the Romanian Senate approved an amendment to Law 303/2004, which stipulates that chief prosecutors of national departments fighting corruption and organized crime, along with their deputies are to be appointed by the Council of Magistrates, not the head of state.

 

Chief prosecutors of the Anticorruption Department (DNA), General Prosecutors’ Office and Department for Organized Crime and Terrorism (DIICOT) will be appointed for periods of three years and may be reinvested one time alone.

 

On November 7, 2008, the country’s prosecutor general Codruta Kovesi extended Morar’s mandate until the end of the year, after Predoiu and President Traian Basescu had not reached an agreement to appoint a new chief prosecutor.