ROMANIAN POLITICS is, by and large, sordid and corrupt. Party barons distribute jobs and public contracts. Oligarchs who own television stations use them as propaganda machines to destroy their opponents’ reputations, or to get cronies elected. Honest politicians such as Klaus Iohannis, the president, and those in the reform-minded Save Romania Union (USR) party are in the minority. Within the European Union, only Hungary, Greece and Bulgaria rank lower than Romania on Transparency International’s Corruption Perception Index.

One shining exception to Romania’s sorry state has been the National Anti-corruption Directorate, or DNA, which drew strength from the anti-corruption conditions attached to the country’s accession to the EU in 2007. It was led from 2013 to 2018 by Laura Codruta Kovesi (pictured), a ramrod-straight prosecutor who oversaw the convictions of thousands of politicians, officials and businesspeople. Ms Kovesi’s determination and effectiveness won the respect of the EU. She is now one of two candidates to head up the new European Public Prosecutor’s Office when it launches next year.

In Romania, however, selfless public service does not usually go unpunished. On March 28th a new prosecutor’s office, created last year to investigate the conduct of magistrates (or, many would say, to harass them), indicted Ms Kovesi herself on charges of corruption. She has been barred from speaking to the media or travelling abroad.

It appears to be an absurd stitch-up. Ms Kovesi’s alleged misconduct consists of getting the supposedly wrong government ministry to pay for repatriating a fugitive suspect arrested in Indonesia eight years ago, when she was Romania’s chief prosecutor. Last year the government used dubious charges of prosecutorial bias to push Ms Kovesi out as head of the DNA. Now it is apparently trying to stop her from winning the job in Brussels.

The most important source of bad blood between Ms Kovesi and Romania’s current government goes back to 2015, when the DNA convicted Liviu Dragnea, head of the ruling Social Democratic Party, of campaign fraud. That conviction prevents Mr Dragnea from serving as prime minister. He nevertheless runs the country from behind the scenes (he is still president of the party), and is appealing against his conviction.



The prospect of Ms Kovesi as chief EU prosecutor is anathema to grifters in Romania’s government. Until now, the European Commission’s fraud investigation division, known as OLAF, has lacked the power to bring cases. When it finds evidence that a country’s officials are misappropriating some of the billions of euros’ worth of aid the EU distributes each year, it can do nothing but hand the dossier to national authorities and politely request that they take action. Justice ministries are often reluctant to take down their own countries’ politicians. The new European Public Prosecutor’s Office would have much greater powers.

Ms Kovesi’s candidacy is backed by the European Parliament. Her indictment was quickly denounced by Antonio Tajani, the parliament’s president, and by Manfred Weber, head of its largest party group, the EPP. But the European Council, which represents the EU’s member governments, had deferred to Romania (the current Council chair) and instead backs a French candidate, Jean-François Bohnert. On Friday the European Commission issued a careful warning to Romania: a spokesperson said it was “crucial that all candidates...are treated fairly in the course of this process.”



There is much at stake. For a decade, the DNA has given Romania a measure of judicial independence and some hope of curing the plague of corruption. The new prosecutor’s office that has indicted Ms Kovesi, and which is controlled by the government’s justice minister, threatens that: any magistrate who angers the government could find themselves a target. “We warned the EU about the fact that this new office destroys the independence of justice in Romania,” says Cristian Ghinea, an MP for the USR party and a candidate in the upcoming European Parliament elections. At a minimum, Romania must allow Ms Kovesi to travel to Brussels to be interviewed for the job of public prosecutor. If the EU allows Romania to torpedo Ms Kovesi’s candidacy, it will signal that it lacks the guts to tackle the corruption rampant in some of its member states.

Correction (April 2nd 2019): A previous version of this piece referred to Romania’s ruling party as the Democratic Party. It is in fact the Social Democratic Party. This has been amended.