An evaluation of European experts presented Friday at the Ministry of Justice says the weak political will of the Parliament majority and local officials is one of the obstacles to the implementation of Romania’s National Anti-corruption Strategy (SNA) from 2012 to 2015.

Other weak points of the SNA implementation are the unsystematically application of prevention measures in the public sector by many agency heads, who are not motivated to set up measures against corruption; also the lack of progress in public procurement.

The evaluation was based on existing reports, strategies and studies, on previous evaluations, interviews with the concerned part during the first national mission on 13-15 April, and on mini-polls among Romanian anti-corruption experts (53 response questionnaires filled).

The SNA goals have nevertheless been met in a high proportion. Some 90 per cent of poll respondents said the strategy had a positive impact on the corruption level, and 53 say it had too many objectives.

The high intensity of the anti-corruption fight is mentioned as a strong point of the SNA implementation, with the General Anti-corruption Directorate setting an example of good practices for the whole public sector. Other pluses were seen in the cooperation platforms and specific evaluations coordinated by the Ministry of Justice..

The external evaluation was performed to help the ministry in analysing the impact of the SNA in 2012-2015, finding the best practices, the shortcomings and the difficulties encountered in the four years of the implementation, and issuing recommendations for the next strategy.

The experts involved were Valts Kalnins of the PROVIDUS Centre for Public Policy, Latvia; Mari-Liis Soot of Estonia’s Justice Ministry; and Olga Savran (Anti-Corruption Division, OECD). They attended the presentation of their evaluation alongside Romania’s Ministry of Justice state secretary Adrian Baboi-Stroe and Direction for Criminality Prevention representative Cornel Calinescu.

AGERPRES

20 May 2016