Former Romanian finance minister sentenced to jail for political corruption

A Romanian court sentenced Darius Valcov, the country’s former finance minister, to six-and-a-half years of jail on Tuesday July 21 for taking a bribe as well as influencing the awarding of public works contracts.

Valcov, 43, was also the economic adviser to the cabinet, as well as conducting some of the most controversial tax cuts and price caps of the then ruling Social Democrat party. However, he denied any of the claims with regards to taking bribes.

The decision is not final, as it is pending Valcov’s appeal.

Romania is the fourth most corrupt country in the European Union, according to Transparency International’s yearly Corruption Perceptions Index of 2018.

This is not the only case against Valcov, with him being sentenced to eight years in jail in 2018 for influence peddling as well as money laundering in a completely separate case. However, this case’s preliminary verdict is also pending appeal.

According to the anti-corruption prosecutors, the two cases mainly concern graft in awarding public works contracts during his time as mayor of Slatina between 2004 and 2012, a town in south Romania.

These prosecutors have secured several convictions of multiple members of the Social Democrat party in the past, including its former leader, Liviu Dragnea.

Dragnea was sentenced to three-and-a-half years of prison in May 2019 for arranging payments for two party members that were employed in jobs that did not actually exist, leading to the end of his time in the Chamber.

Such investigations have led to them exposing conflicts of interest, abuse of power, fraud, as well as awarding state contracts for bribes, the latter being the main reason for Valcov’s sentence.

In the past, there have been numerous attempts by the Social Democrat party to try and decriminalise some of the corruption offences or go against proof, yet this all proved to be in vain, losing a no confidence vote in 2019, resulting in one of the largest street protests that Romania has ever experienced.

The EU constantly keeps Romania’s justice system under special monitoring to make sure that such acts of corruption are minimised, and if possible, completely eradicated.