Romania Passes Law to Confiscate Prisoners’ Ill-Gotten Gains

Doubling down on the corruption for which it remains notorious, Romania’s parliament has passed a law allowing authorities to seize the assets of criminals jailed for serious corruption offences.

A general view on the Romanian Parliament in Bucharest, December 2016. Archive photo: EPA/ROBERT GHEMENT

The lower chamber of parliament in Romania on Tuesday unanimously adopted an amendment allowing the state to seize illegitimately obtained wealth from those who have received prison terms of at least four years.

The measure affects goods or wealth obtained in a period of five years before or after the crime was committed. It also applies to goods transferred to a third party, if the third party was aware that the transfer had been made to avoid it being confiscated.

The ruling National Liberal Party chief whip, Florin Roman, said the measure would target “those who have enriched themselves with public and private money”, adding that the legislation approved is in line with “the EU directive that provides for the confiscation of wealth … accumulated through thievery”.

The amendment was put forward in 2017 by then-minister of Justice, Ana Birchall, who was part of the government then led by the Social Democratic Party, PSD. Despite serving in the PSD cabinet, Birchall was critical of the changes being made to the justice system pushed forward by her party.

The Social Democrats were then led by the strongman and de facto prime minister Liviu Dragnea, who was sentenced to three-and-a-half years in prison for corruption in May last year.

Dragnea championed hotly disputed changes to the justice system that included reducing prison terms and the statute of limitations of certain corruption offences – including the one for which he himself was finally convicted.

His agenda was heavily criticized by the EU, the US and other partners of Romania. At home, hundreds of thousands of people took to the streets to denounce what they saw as an assault on the rule of law.

After his conviction, the PSD, which has also voted in favour of the so-called “confiscation law”, agreed to drop Dragnea’s changes to the justice system but the sincerity of that commitment is doubted by many in Romania.

The legislation approved on Tuesday will now go to President Klaus Iohannis for promulgation.

The legal change has been widely hailed as a milestone in Romania’s efforts to combat corruption.

Romania, which joined the EU in 2007, is perceived as the most corrupt country in the bloc, together with Bulgaria. Due to the two country’s shortcomings in the field of the rule of law and the fight against corruption, the European Commission still monitors justice in Romania and Bulgaria through the so-called Cooperation and Verification Mechanism, an instrument applied exclusively to these two Member States.