Rumänien: Kampfansage an Korruption

Basescu macht Korruption zu einem nationalen sicherheitspolitischen Thema, sagt aber gleichzeitig, dass das Problem nicht so groß ist wie manche behaupten. Mit diesem Thema befasst sich Razvan Amariei in Transitions Online.

Poor levels of governing, mainly due to a high level of corruption in Romanian public institutions, became one of five focus topics of a new national security strategy on 28 February.

The fight against corruption was turned into a top priority by the National Defense Supreme Council (CSAT), a body composed of the president of the republic, the prime minister, several ministers, and the chiefs of the secret services.

Even while ratcheting up the fight against corruption, President Traian Basescu and the country’s other leaders rejected charges that Romania is an altogether corrupt country.

It seems an article published on 25 February in the German daily Handelsblatt, which used the term „general corruption“ in regard to Romania, provoked strong reactions from the country’s new governing majority.

Other threats to Romania’s security as described by the defense council are familiar enough: the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, totalitarian regimes supporting terrorism, and crises in Romania’s strategic neighborhood, such the one in Moldova’s Transdniester.

The topic of international terrorism, and the actions that Romania should take to fight it, drew considerable attention from politicians and journalists. 

„Romania has to decide if it will act preventatively or stick with a reactive policy. As the CSAT’s president, I support the preventative actions, but the final decision will be made in the next 30 days,“ Basescu said.

„Will Romania attack other states just as a measure of prevention? That would be a violation of UN and EU norms,“ wrote journalist Bogdan Munteanu in the daily Adevarul.

It was corruption, however, that dominated the headlines last week. Basescu pledged to turn the issue into a national security priority during the campaign for the December 2004 elections, which, somewhat surprisingly, propelled him to the country’s presidency.

„This rotten system must be cleansed and replaced with one that obeys the law,“ he said during the campaign.

Basescu continued to push for the fight against corruption after being sworn in, saying, „I gave six months to police, prosecutors, and judges to change the way they fight corruption. If they can’t do their jobs, I will ask the parliament to adopt new laws in order to replace them.“

Basescu also stressed that „foreign companies [doing business in Romania] are the most important corruption sensors.“

Representatives of foreign companies are thought to be targeted by corrupt officials for bribes, something foreign businessmen have often complained of to their embassies, in contrast with their Romanian counterparts and ordinary citizens, who are thought to be more likely to pay bribes and not make much fuss about it.

But the president announced last week that „Romania will no longer accept the corrupt country label,“ a reference to the country’s poor standing abroad and more specifically to the „general corruption“ term used by Handelsblatt.

Basescu underlined that Romania has 22 million inhabitants, who should not be all labeled corrupt. He also asked that Western authorities single out corrupt politicians, officials, and local or foreign firms operating in Romania.

According to the Handelsblatt article, Markus Ferber, the leader of the German Christian Democrats in the European Parliament and an important player in the EP conservative group, asked Olli Rehn, European commissioner for enlargement, to assess „very seriously“ by 13 April–when the EP is scheduled to ratify the accession treaties for Romania and Bulgaria–whether Romania has made real progresses in the fight against corruption.

„I can’t imagine how in such a short time the new Romanian government would have managed to achieve remarkable success,“ Ferber was quoted as saying. According to Handelsblatt, even European Commission President Jose Manuel Durrao Barroso has assured Romania’s opponents in the EU structures of his support.

But Rehn, who arrived in Bucharest for a two-day visit on 27 February, announced that the accession treaty would be signed in April as planned. „But there is still a lot to be done in the next two years,“ he told Romanian journalists.

Prime Minister Calin Popescu-Tariceanu, while stressing that Ferber was not expressing the official position of European conservatives, said that the statement „is nevertheless an element that we will take into consideration.“

Basescu’s handling of the corruption issue has received mixed reactions, however. 

„The president reacted rationally: He asked for names,“ said political analyst Traian Ungureanu. „There is no such thing as anonymous corruption. The founders of the system that robbed the national budget and treasuries have names and company registration documents.“

To read the full text of the article, visit the Transitions Online website.