In 2019, PNL spectacularly won the European parliamentary elections amid massive voter turnout against „criminal” Dragnea, who was soon to enter prison. The Liberals were the main beneficiaries of a wave called pro-justice and pro-integrity, which brought thousands of people to the streets.
After 5 years, one of the main candidates of the Liberals for the leadership of a County Council is accused of multiple corruption acts committed while in the position he is running for, and the court has imposed judicial control on him.
Press documents from Iulian Dumitrescu's file show that we are dealing with much more than some isolated facts; we are talking about authentic corrupt clientelistic networks that have replaced/taken over other clientelistic networks of the same county, patronized by the PSD baron of the area dethroned by Iulian Dumitrescu.
Sources from political and judicial circles say we wouldn't have known about these networks if Iulian Dumitrescu hadn't clashed over power sharing with two other liberal barons with the same profile, Lucian Bode, exponent of the "Carpathian Cartel", and Thuma Hubert, the master of Ilfov, the real estate kingpin around the Capital, booming after all real estate projects in Bucharest were blocked, and politically and morally tied just like his friend, Florentin Pandele, to the nursing homes scandal.
PNL pretended not to validate Iulian Dumitrescu's candidacy, and after it became a fact implicitly, it pretended to submit it for analysis to a body that is currently not in the locality, and it's uncertain when it will return, probably after June 9.
Regarding the "Carpathian Cartel," PNL hasn't said a word, just as the Liberals who were making waves on TV during the nursing homes scandal seemed to have no idea who the president of the Ilfov County Council was.
- The PNL Swans in the Nursing Homes Scandal. The Disgusting Show of Non-Responsibility (documents)
- Rareș Bogdan, about the Mayor of Sinaia targeted by Recorder: If you are smart enough and talk to the press, you can turn the situation around, you can do jujitsu
The PNL lists in the territory are peppered with suspects and defendants for various acts, including corruption. The famous couple Costel Alexe "Tablă" and Mihai Chirică represent an emblematic case.
It should be added that the Minister of Justice defies the law almost ostentatiously by refusing to answer under Law 544 what the public money expenditure was for a trip to Brazil kept secret until it was uncovered by the Brazilians.
PNL's defense in the aforementioned cases is strikingly similar to that of PSD in the worst anti-justice years of the social democrats – they are not definitively convicted, benefiting from the presumption of innocence.
For all these cases, the sanction can only be, and should be, political. Through voting. However, these individuals appear on the lists precisely because they bring votes. And if it remains this way, if the "criminals" on the PNL lists keep their positions, it means that the public validates them. And there won't be much else to discuss.
But, to be fair (not necessarily popular, of course), it is a real test of adherence to principles also for the USR electorate, another party raised on the anti-justice wave, called upon to vote for "criminals" in the old sense, before the rediscovery of the presumption of innocence.
For example, the USR electorate is called to vote for a mayoral candidate charged and with a validated incompatibility report in the first instance for acts committed while in the position of mayor.
They are called to vote for all kinds of barons or proxies of barons (Nica, Palaz, the pupil of Miuțescu from Argeș, the pupil of Iulian Dumitrescu from Călărași), assumed candidates from PMP and Forța Dreptei under the umbrella of dishonor, hence, the United Right Alliance.
The discourse of "political harassment with criminal cases" or "minor offenses" seems to be copied from the PSD playbook. Dragnea didn't go to jail for a billion-dollar scam.
Magda Gradinaru recently asked on SpotMedia.ro who has muffled the anticorruption tambourine.
We will have the answer very soon, on June 9. And it will be given by the electorate. If the people who took to the streets in 2017-2018 will validate suspects and defendants just because they are from their camp, it means that the integrity and anticorruption theme is truly dead in Romania.
Of course, we can find excuses and justifications for anything and anytime, but Dragnea's story shows that when public intolerance is at its peak, no one can silence the anticorruption tambourine. If we always settle for the lesser evil, we deserve our fate no matter how much we complain.