The abuses of power of Prime Minister Ciucă. The general is destroying entire institutions to escape plagiarism accusations

General Nicolae Ciucă, propelled as Prime Minister by the toxic PSD-PNL-UDMR coalition, has moved on to a new autocratic phase. He is destroying entire institutions to save himself from the accusation of plagiarism. This time he has targeted the CNATDCU, the council that rules on plagiarism decisions, a council made up of unanimously recognized specialists and completely politically independent, which not even Ponta has managed to abolish. It is a feat that neither Victor Ponta nor Liviu Dragnea have managed. In Ciucă’s case, it is already the fourth abuse of power in the plagiarism case. Unimaginable in a country that claims to be a functioning democracy.

• The provision for the de facto abolition of the CNATDCU appears in the draft laws on education, according to Edupedu.ro. The bills are promoted by Minister Sorin Cîmpeanu, validated by Prime Minister Ciucă, and inspired by President Iohannis’ ” Educated Romania ” project. The drafts are put up for public debate, and Minister Cîmpeanu – the instrument through which the destruction of the education system is accomplished – has announced that in September the draft will be sent to Parliament.

Why is this an abuse of power by the Prime Minister? Because the bills are undertaken by the government he leads and are aimed at solving his own problem with the plagiarism accusation. Please note: the bills are not submitted to Parliament by the Ministry of Education or any MP, but by the government led by Prime Minister Nicolae Ciucă.

Ciucă is ticking off his fourth attempt to solve his plagiarism by using the enormous formal and informal power that the post of prime minister confers on him. Let’s recall the previous three attempts:

1. In March, the CNATDCU’s analysis of the plagiarism complaint was brutally stopped by the General Prosecutor’s Office, which pretended to open a criminal investigation and took all the original documents. „The analysis could not begin. Why? Because the file could not be constituted. Why? Because those documents are no longer at the disposal of UEFISCDI and the ministry,” as they have been taken away by the prosecutors or not being transmitted by the university that awarded the doctorate, Mircea Dumitru, interim president of the CNATDCU, told Edupedu.ro at the time. The General Prosecutor’s Office has not yet finalized the investigation, but the CNATDCU’s analysis remains blocked.The PNL subsequently voted in favor of sending Bogdan Licu, deputy attorney general and the one who promoted the creation of the criminal investigation, as a judge to the Constitutional Court.

2. Also in March, a judge at the Bucharest Court of Appeal suspended the effects of the registration of complaints of plagiarism in Prime Minister Nicolae Ciucă’s doctoral thesis, arguing in her reasoning that Romania needs stability and that the issue of Ciucă’s plagiarism could serve the interests of his political opponents. G4Media.ro discovered, in the reasoning of the sentence, fragments copied word for word from other publicly available sentences. On the other hand, Libertatea pointed out that Judge Ionela Tudor took over the arguments of Prime Minister Nicolae Ciucă’s lawyers in her reasoning.
3. In June, a full bench of the Bucharest Court of Appeal annulled all the complaints submitted earlier this year to the CNATDCU concerning Ciucă’s plagiarism. Judge Marius Iosif, who made the decision to annul the complaints, was appointed in 2007 by the then Liberal Minister of Justice to a post in the ministry and later to the post of Director General of the National Administration of Prisons. G4Media revealed that Judge Marius Iosif, promoted by the Liberals in the past to various positions, was a fellow Freemason with government spokesman Dan Cărbunaru. In addition, G4Media revealed how the file was directed to Judge Iosif through the „cover method”. See more details here

Now, the draft education laws are Prime Minister Ciucă’s fourth attempt to escape the plagiarism accusations. If the laws come into force as they currently stand, Ciucă will be virtually given an amnesty. How? Through two distinct mechanisms.

First, the task of checking plagiarised doctoral work is taken away from the CNADTCU and passed to universities – many of them hotbeds of corruption. In Ciucă’s case, he should be checked by the Carol 1st Defense University. A bad joke, obviously. No one imagines that in a militarized system this university would dare to attack the PM.

Secondly, the draft promoted by Sorin Cîmpeanu does not provide for deadlines for the implementation of the new mechanisms for verifying plagiarism, which means a de facto amnesty.

The situation is scandalous and reminiscent of Victor Ponta’s attempts to cover up his own plagiarism, or Dragnea’s attempt to force the PSD governments to give an amnesty for his acts of corruption.

Why are Ciucă and the power system around him, coordinated by Klaus Iohanis, making these huge efforts, which involve the gross violation of every public morality to the point of breaking the law? The ultimate goal is for Ciuca to run for the presidential elections, which is why he must be cleared of the plagiarism charges once and for all. Ciucă is Iohannis’s choice, who hopes to profit from the general’s promotion. And Sorin Cîmpeanu, who posed as a reformist, is also just an obedient enforcer of the system’s orders.

General Ciucă, once legendary as a real fighter on the battlefield in Iraq, turns out to be a political hooligan, using his temporary position for personal gain. He is now protected, and it is hard to believe that state institutions will deal with him. He also has almost total media protection, the mainstream media doesn’t breathe a word about the scandal. Just as the controlled press did in the scandal concerning the national security laws, and on other sensitive issues for the PSD, PNL, the government and President Iohannis. But Ciucă is protected while in office, just like his predecessors. Sooner or later, the myth of the general will be dispelled, and Ciucă will be held politically and legally accountable for his abuse of power. No one has ever got away with such a monstrosity.

Translated from Romanian by Ovidiu Harfas