Communist MP Elena Bodnarenco didn’t present herself at the National Anticorruption Center on March 23 to be questioned as a witness over her public statements about an alleged corruption attempt. Contacted by IPN, the MP said she didn’t go to the Center because she took part in public debates within the Parliament’s commission on public administration, regional development and climate change that she heads.

Head of the Center’s Prosecution Division Bogdan Zumbreanu told the press that in the March 22 questioning, the MPs refused to write her statements and sign the warning concerning liability for falsehood. She asked to be questioned on March 23, in the presence of a lawyer, but failed to appear. “We understand that the MP fears to write her statements as she assumes responsibility for false depositions. Moreover, she accused a person of a serious offense and should bear responsibility is she does not provide evidence,” he stated.

Zumbreanu also said that the MP didn’t want to reveal the name of the person who tried to corrupt her so that she left the Communist group. Under the legislation, the verbal statements are not a proof. If the MP refuses to write her statements and will not say the name of the person who allegedly committed the offense, the National Anticorruption Center will submit the materials to the Prosecutor’s Office, with the request not to open an investigation trough insufficiency of evidence.

In a TV program at the beginning of March, Elena Bodnarenco said that a Democratic MP tried to corrupt her so that she left the Party of Communists. “They offered be a six-digit sum, in dollars, for voting the Filip Government and leaving the PCRM. If I had chosen posts for me or someone from my family, the sum would have been lower,” said then Elena Bodnarenco.