331 candidates eligible for office have failed Clean Romania’s integrity test. Our criteria in making this list can be accessed here, and the full list can be reached here. After sorting the list by party, the Social Democratic Party (PSD), the National Liberal Party (PNL) and the Alliance of European Liberals and Democrats (ALDE) take the podium.
PSD leads all other parties, having more than 100 candidates with integrity issues running for office. It should be said however, that the PSD is also the party with the highest number of eligible candidates (according to opinion polls), and this might have played a role in increasing the PSD exposure. On the other hand, it is unsurprising that the biggest party would have the most problematic candidates, what is truly worrying is the very high position of problem-candidates on the party lists.
The list could start with the very leader of the PSD, who is currently serving a suspended sentence for corrupt actions he undertook as a politician, however, the legal system did not consider it necessary to limit his electoral rights, choosing to rely on heightened public opinion pressure (a rather pointless endeavor in a country where mayors are elected even when they run for office literally from prison).
The PNL, who has openly claimed to put forward cleaner electoral lists, and has fewer eligible candidates than the PSD, will be more or less surprised to see that at a proportional level they are similar to the PSD, with over 60 candidates presenting integrity problems. Only two of its candidates have been convicted and one of them managed to avoid serving his sentence because his case was time-barred.
The liberals, be them from the old PNL, or from the now-defunct Democratic-Liberal Party (PDL), who has merged with the PNL, are champions when it comes to conflicts of interest, be them from various business deals with the state, or from various nepotistic ventures. It is quite hard to observe and analyze the PNL on political party-switching, because the party itself has recently expanded by merging with the PDL, and it also has various “branches” that either move away or closer to the party.
ALDE is very close to the PNL in the overall number if candidates with integrity problems, it has over 50 people on the Black List. This is a considerably high number, especially since ALDE is polling just below 5% (anything lower than 5% means they fail to meet the threshold and will not enter Parliament), and has therefore a smaller number of candidates seen as eligible, and thus the overall number of ALDE candidates monitored was lower.
ALDE is a relatively new political party, it broke away from the old PNL, party switching is less relevant here, but an interesting development with ALDE is that most of its corrupt candidates are grouped in a few specific areas, they are part of various local businessmen’s circles of influence. ALDE’s lists also feature a couple of former ministers who should have had criminal cases on the roll, but they have been spared by Parliament’s immunity vote. ALDE also has the biggest share of candidates who are still currently prosecuted for various acts of corruption.
The People’s Movement Party (PMP) has 40 troublesome candidates on the Black List, and they are the leading party for party-switching. This is of no surprise, considering their merger with the National Union for the Progress of Romania (UNPR), the party-switchers’ very own party, a political group that has ensured for the legislatives sessions the passage (or failure) of a number of Cabinets. Considering the nature of the Romanian political climate, it’s of no surprise to observe the emergence of a vacuum-party, especially for former members of the People’s Party – Dan Diaconescu (PP-DD), a leaderless party after Dan Diaconescu was sent to prison. The PMP’s old guard also consists of people who were close allies of former President Traian Basescu since 2004, following him from PNL to the Liberal-Democratic Party (PLD), who later merged with PDL and later tore itself apart in the political conflict between the Blaga and Udrea groups. Of course, suspicions from within the PMP can also stem from general Oprea’s former military personnel, and former undercover intelligence agents that exposed themselves.
The United Romania Party (PRU) is also riddled with troublesome candidates: 26 candidates have issues, even though the overall number of monitored candidates was smaller due to PRU’s very low chances of reaching the 5% threshold. Party-switching is the main offence for PRU, but it does not represent the party’s biggest problem. The major issue for PRU is the high number of candidates with judicial problems, ranging from high-profile corruption cases to sentences for various deliberate offences.
The Democratic Union of Hungarians in Romania (UDMR) seems to have the “freshest” candidate lists, only 10 of those running from UDMR being featured on the Black List. A problem for UDMR seems to be its inability to distance itself from some of its most enduring and controversial MPs, and from those who consider that the fight against corruption should be tuned down (some of which even put forward bills with that exact purpose).
Even the new Save Romania Party (USR) is featured on the black list, despite most of its candidates being unknown r new to politics. Two of the worrisome candidates are former Cabinet members, and the other one just switched to his third “start-up” party.
See here the full Black List of the 2016 Parliamentarian elections
