Romania’s Anti-Corruption Chief Fired, Critics Cry Foul

Romania’s chief anti-corruption prosecutor Laura Codruta Kovesi, whose office has investigated 60 top-ranking officials in one of the European Union’s most corrupt countries, was fired over misconduct charges critics said were a smokescreen to hide government resistance to fight bribery and graft and to insulate politicians from prosecution.

She was forced out reluctantly when one of her key allies, President Klaus Iohannis, facing the threat of suspension from his party, complied with a ruling from the country’s highest court that she had to go.

She said the charges, including incompetence, falsifying evidence and harming the country’s image by talking to foreign journalists were trumped up by a government which wants to protect itself and friends from being probed for wrongdoing.

Her investigations also went after a former prime minister, more than 40 lawmakers and the country’s rich elite, drawing their wrath and what she suggested was a coordinated effort to get rid of her so they could go about corrupt ways without impediments.

“It’s clearly a blow to the anti-corruption fight,” Paul Ivan, a Brussels-based analyst at the European Policy Center, told the financial news agency Bloomberg. “We’re witnessing an assault against the rule of law in Romania based on the personal interests of a part of the political class.”

The country’s political leadership had tried to decriminalize corruption – for them – leading to mass protests. Kovesi and her staff of 330 brought in more than 2 billion euros ($2.4 billion) in assets and she had become a kind of celebrity.

She said relentless attacks against her by the government “shows us that we are on the right path” and vowed the fight against corruption would not stop with her dismissal.

The European Commission, which has done essentially nothing to intervene and is only monitoring the country’s justice system, only issued a press release saying if her replacement isn’t as aggressive it would reassess whether to do anything.

Flanked by prosecutors who applauded her, a visibly emotional Kovesi later hit out at politicians who are passing laws that critics say will make it harder to punish graft. She said lawmakers were seeking “protection for the past, the present and the future,” the Associated Press reported.

She said she would remain a prosecutor but not at the anti-corruption agency, and ended her statement with an appeal to ordinary Romanians: “Corruption can be beaten, don’t give up!” She added, “The brutal way in which they’re changing the legislation is proof that they seek protection for their past, current and future deeds.”

Iohannis said efforts to root out high-level corruption “mustn’t slow down or be abandoned,” saying it “translates to a lack of hospitals, schools, highways and an efficient public administration.”