The Section for the Investigation of the magistrates is being dismantled

The story of one of the most controversial structures in the Romanian judiciary is coming to an end these days. The government in Bucharest on Monday endorsed a draft law on dismantling the special Section for the Investigation of the Judiciary, known in Romania as SIIJ. The head of the coalition government, Liberal Nicolae Ciucă, has recalled that this is an objective Romania has also assumed within the Cooperation and Verification Mechanism (CVM) through which Brussels has been monitoring the rule of law in Romania ever since the country's entry into the European Union in 2007.

Under the new amendments, other structures have been authorized to take over the SIIJ files and their resolutions are to be made public within 60 days since the law has come into effect, by the Prosecutor's Office with the High Court of Cassation and Justice and the other the competent offices, which are carrying on work on the aforementioned files.

High-ranking prosecutors and justices accused of various offences are to be investigated by the Prosecutor's Office with the High Court of Cassation and Justice whereas the other prosecutors and judges by prosecutor's offices of other courts.

The jobs in the organizational chart of the SIIJ will remain in the organizational chart of the Prosecutor's Office with the High Court of Cassation and Justice, part of the Penal and Crime Investigation Department. Starting with the date of the SIIJ dismantling, its prosecutors, including those in higher positions, will be returning to the prosecutor's offices they belonged to. The aforementioned draft will be submitted for Parliament debates and approval.

The largest part of the press in Bucharest, as well as legal experts, have constantly denounced the SIIJ as a means of putting pressure on the magistrates and hindering Romania's anti-graft actions.

The initiator of this project was believed to be the former Social Democratic strongman Liviu Dragnea who had dominated Romania's political life for a couple of years before being arrested on corruption charges in 2019.

The present head of European Public Prosecutor's Office, EPPO, Laura Codruta Kovesi, who had previously headed Romania's Anti-Corruption Directorate with unmatched effectiveness, confessed shortly before her dismissal by president Klaus Iohannis in June 2018, following a Constitutional Court ruling, that in those years, the biggest challenge for the Romanian judiciary was keeping its judges and prosecutors independent. 

"There have been repeated tries at amending the anti-corruption legislation in order to limit the legislative instruments used by anti-corruption prosecutors or attempts at decriminalizing some actions. There were situations in which requests for lifting the immunity of corrupt politicians had been turned down", Kovesi went on to say.  

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