Sergiu Litvinenco: The contest for the head of PCCOCS must be abolished
The Competition for the position of head of the Prosecutor's Office for Combating Organised Crime and Special Cases should be suspended and resumed when a new composition of the Superior Council of Prosecutors is formed, passed through the pre-vetting procedure, Justice Minister Sergiu Litvinenco told ProTv last night.
While previously the chief prosecutor of the Anti-Corruption Prosecutor's Office, Veronica Dragalin, was selected under the same procedure, the justice minister says the situations differ now. According to Sergiu Litvinenco, the annulment of the competition for the head of the PCCOCS does not cancel the competition for the position of chief prosecutor at the Anti Corruption Prosecutor's Office.
"Sergiu Litvinenco: - The initiator of this competition can cancel this competition as long as it has not been finalised. Lorena Bogza: - The logical question is why didn't you go then, because this whole thing has been going on since November? Sergiu Litvinenco: - Because I was not at the meeting when the decision to initiate this competition was taken. I didn't launch the procedure to abandon this competition, because I thought there wouldn't be such situations with so much mutual criticism between the members of the committee and the candidates".
Today, the CSP will meet to decide whether to cancel the competition for the head of the PCCOCS, following disputes between the examiners and the candidates. Former Deputy Minister of Justice Nicolae Eșanu, referring to the situation created around the competition for the head of the PCCOCS, says that disputes over the evaluation of candidates in the Superior Council of Magistracy and the Superior Council of Prosecutors indicate that the government has compromised this process because it failed to ensure broad consensus. This failure of evaluation is also his personal failure, he argues, but he will continue his efforts to contribute towards change.
On 26 January, Iulian Groza, one of the members of the pre-selection commission for the PCCOCS chief prosecutor, claimed pressure and intimidation attempts and asked for the results of the first stage of the competition to be declared null and void, while one of the selected prosecutors asked for the competition to be cancelled.
Also on that day, several requests and complaints were submitted to the Superior Council of Prosecutors (SCP) regarding the procedures of the competition for the position of Chief Prosecutor of the Office of the Prosecutor for Combating Organised Crime and Special Cases (PCCOCS).
