Oleg Efrim: Any anticorruption initiative of Justice Ministry meets with opposition

{Info-Prim Neo interview with Minister of Justice Oleg Efrim of the series “Year 2012 in Moldova’s and Moldovans’ life”, article No 5. of 12, [originally published on December 17] } [– What was the state of the national justice in 2012?] – Before making an assessment, I would say that justice in any society is its backbone and, evidently, it’s not easy to make the vertebral column straight when it has been curved for a very long time. At least it’s not possible for this transformation to take place overnight. The state of affairs in justice today is considered not very good. Our society now needs more than ever that our justice does its duty so that the people could trust it. Unfortunately, we lost too much time in this sector. We speak about changes, but they were brought about late. It must be noted yet that the transformation process started. A system approach to the changes needed in the legal system was adopted. The justice sector reform strategy was approved a year ago. It is a very important policy document and I want to note that it is for the first time that our country accepted a visionary document of transformations in the legal system for an average, five-year period. Besides being a strategic document for an average timeframe, it is for the first time that we make changes to the whole justice system, not only to parts of it, as they tried until now in the legal system or the prosecution service and other authorities. What we aim to do based on this strategy and the plan of action for implementing the justice sector reform strategy, is to bring about changes, first of all to the law education in higher education establishments, and then to reform the Constitutional Court, with emphasis on the transformation of the legal system, the prosecution service, the Ministry of the Interior, the juridical professions such as lawyers, notaries and bailiffs. I’m far from being triumphal and from saying that we solved the problems in the legal system or we already have the legal system we wanted. It is a rather short period of time since we started to implement the justice sector reform strategy, but I want to say that considerable steps towards change have been taken. These steps refer to a multitude of aspects, mainly to the transformation in the judicial system and the combating of corruption. We follow the reform implementation schedule that we set, in accordance with the justice sector reform strategy. We go towards achieving the wanted results with confident and determined steps. [– Do you think that the announced period of five years is sufficient for reforming the legal system?] – It would be ideal for this to happen overnight, as our people want and as I want. But we must be realistic. We must understand that we do not speak only about the adoption of laws, though the adoption of laws is an important process and rather difficult in certain areas. The approval of the regulations is only the beginning. In 2011 and 2012, we implemented a number of very important amendments, including to the Law on the Judicial Organization, the Law on the Supreme Council of Magistrates, and the Law on the Supreme Court of Justice, aimed at strengthening the autonomy of the legal system and the independence of the judicial administration body of the Supreme Council of Magistrates, reforming the Supreme Court of Justice, and reducing the number of judges by 33%, procedural changes to the Civil Procedure Code and the Criminal Procedure Code, and legislative measures aimed at making the judges more responsible in doing justice. I want to also mention the drafting of a bill concerning the disciplinary punishment of judges and important anticorruption changes to the legal system, both concerning the exclusion of privileges for judges who are expelled from the system, the exclusion of contravention immunity for judges and of immunity for acts of corruption, and to the Law on the Selection, Career and Performance of Judges. I would say that this is a key law in the future process of accepting judges into the system, of promoting them and assessing their performance. It should be noted that under this law, the judicial body must go through the performance assessment procedure over the next two years. The adoption of laws does not ensure results. I usually say that the law does not have a head and a tail. It is not implemented alone. The burden for the transformations in this sector is now borne by such authorities as the Supreme Council of Magistrates, the National Anticorruption Center, the Prosecutor General’s Office, and the National Integrity Commission. Why? Because these authorities must ensure the implementation of the laws and this process is to be applied daily, together with all those interested. I think this average period of five years that is needed for implementing the strategy is enough for changing the legal system. [– In an interview given to Info-Prim Neo on the occasion of the Independence Day this year, President Nicolae Timofti said the reform of the legal system started and we will soon speak about justice in a different way. Is this statement a kind of task given to certain state institutions, including the Ministry of Justice, maybe first of all? To what extent does ‘soon’ refer to the passing 2012?] – As minister of justice, I’m glad that the head of state is a judge by profession. Now he can look at the state of affairs in the legal system from a different angle. Surely, the Ministry of Justice must be a leader by the transformations required by society and planned in the legal system as it is a central public authority that must promote policies in justice. Moreover, the minister of justice is the official who bears political responsibility for the changes or for achieving the set objectives, even if we must ensure the transformation of certain authorities and institutions. We have the difficult task of coordinating the whole reform process. It’s not an easy task at least because we must ensure the consensus of all the institutions that must be restructured and that are involved in the implementation of the justice sector reform strategy. There are about 30 such institutions. In fact, the real problem resides not in the large number of institutions that must be reformed, but in the multitude of interests and the resistance on the part of the justice sector players. [– The general perception points to a great distrust in the law enforcement bodies, including the legal system with all its components, based mainly on corruption that is said to be dominating these spheres. In a news conference held at Info-Prim Neo recently, it was suggested instituting capital punishment for such acts as a last lever that can ensure a good result. Can we achieve these results without excesses of the kind? ] – I will not try to choose the words at this question as I stated my opinion on the problem of corruption in justice not only once. When I say justice, I do not mean only the judicial system. This problem has the most serious consequences. Making an analysis of the penalties required for acts of corruption, some of my colleagues asked me why we try to toughen up punishments for corruption if the exiting punishments, ether harsh or mild, are not applied. And this is right. If we look back, we fill find only one judge who was convicted of corruption, in 1996. Everybody speaks about corruption in justice, but we do not have at least effective investigations in the field. The Ministry of Justice aims to create the legal framework needed to ensure sufficient instruments for the authorities that deal with corruption combating, and we take consistent steps in this respect. We already spoke about the withdrawal of immunity for acts of corruption. The Prosecutor General’s Office said that it cannot investigate acts of corruption because the judges have immunity. On August 31, 2012, the immunity of judges for acts of corruption was excluded. More than three months have passed and no judge is yet under investigation. The fact that nothing happens in this field only fuels the people’s distrust. The Ministry of Justice worked out and promoted this measure, offering the National Integrity Commission and the Prosecutor General’s Office this instrument so that they could investigate acts of corruption. Now the ball is in the field of the authorities that should combat corruption. I want to be understood correctly. The goal in itself is not seeing a judge behind bars. It would be ideal not to speak about corruption in the legal system if it hadn’t existed there. But, until everybody realizes that corruption exists in the legal system, we want the authorities to take energetic actions to investigate the acts of corruption, using al the necessary instruments. We designed a series of anticorruption initiatives in the public system in general, which are today being discussed at public debates. They provide for the confiscation of property for illegal enrichment, the imposition of criminal punishment for illegal enrichment, the use of the polygraph before allowing judges and prosecutors to enter the system, the use of integrity tests in justice. It would be ideal if the Supreme Council of Magistrates and the judges wanted to fight and to contribute to the reformation of the legal system. When the people are asked what they believe about corruption in justice, they usually say that the whole judicial system is corrupt. But we have honest judges who, unfortunately, are associated with the corrupt ones. I would like the honest judges to support us in our initiatives. They should start the fight and clean the system from inside because this will lead to the combating of corruption and the increase in confidence in justice. Regretfully, besides not feeling this support, any anticorruption initiative of the Ministry of Justice meets with opposition from judges especially. There appear ill reactions to these initiatives. It is hard to accept that those who will be reformed will support the reforms because this will mean changing the way of living and working. But we will be insistent in promoting these measures because the state must fight corruption where it exists and ensure efficient justice for the people. [– As deputy head of the Justice Reform Council, can you say how the reforms in other systems were implemented in 2012, including in the prosecution service, and the internal bodies. ] – It’s true that some of the authorities are reorganized slowly or are not at all reorganized in accordance with the Government’s plans and the people’s expectations. Changes in justice take place, even if at a lower pace. I will give some examples here. I think the whole society was surprised when some of the judges of the Supreme Court of Justice started to be dismissed for the simple fact that they did not fully declare their property. This has never happened before. There are judges who are prosecuted for committing certain illegal acts in their work, or who have been punished disciplinarily. The punishments are larger in number and more transparent than earlier. We also see a rapid transformation trend at the Ministry of the Interior, both at legislative level and at practical level. At the same time, and I think this is not only my opinion, the changes in the prosecution services are late. The non-reformation of the prosecution service is one of the main reasons for which we continue to be monitored by the Council of Europe, practically from the moment we became members of the Council. The European institutions do not consider those changes that have been adopted until now as real ones. Unfortunately, things don’t go as wanted. The reform strategy includes a calendar for the Prosecutor General’s Office too. Some of the constitutional provisions and of stipulations concerning the immediate period, 2013- 2014, will have to be modified. But, I think that the actions concerning the prosecutor’s independence from the administration of the Prosecutor’s Office could have been adopted and implemented already at this stage. We surely have different views about the place and role of the Prosecutor’s Office in the system of the law enforcement bodies in general. There have always been discussions as to whether the Prosecutor Generals’ Office is efficient under parliamentary control or not or there should be executive control and the judges should have the status of magistrates that would ensure the independence of judges. What we must do is to find the place of the Prosecutor Generals’ Office and to ensure its independence so that it can achieve its goals. [– We intentionally narrowed the theme of this interview that is somehow generalizing to the reforms in justice done in 2012. The real reform in the legal system and the combating of corruption, including in justice, are the two major conditions imposed by the EU in exchange for its unprecedented support for Moldova. Without reform, there won’t be support and without support there won’t be European integration with all its consequences. How many people at the Ministry of Justice, in the legal system and in Moldova in general understand this? Were there enough people in 2012 who acted based on this understanding? If not, will there be in 2013 and 2014? ] – The reform in justice and those partially painful transformations that we make are not for the EU or somebody else from outside. We do not try to create a product for export. Our people need theses changes because they are those who must benefit from an equitable public service called justice. Certainly, these reforms cannot be done without the support provided by the EU. The €60 million offered for the implementation of reforms in justice until 2014, which represents over half of the necessary sum, is a considerable support. It’s true that we must manage this money very efficiently. We must think how to ensure real changes in justice, not only to meet the permanent requests to increase the resources in the legal system. If you see the reactions, either from the legal system or the Prosecution’s Office, they say they do not have money for implementing the changes, but the resources are sought for raising the salaries and for ensuring appropriate work conditions. The money cannot yet change the mentality and servilism. We must avoid regarding the reform as a necessity of resources. We need a real change that would ensure independence in justice and, believe me, our efforts are aimed at this. The people at the Ministry of Justice and in the Government realize the importance of this moment and the importance in general of the changes required in justice. I’m sure that a large part of the people in the legal system and other systems understand the necessity of transformations, but the initiative from inside comes with delay. Thus, we have to stimulate it and to find means by which to catalyze the change of mentality, attitudes, approach so that we create fair justice for our people. This critical mass that is needed to ensure the changes from inside will appear because new people enter the legal system and there are enough persons with integrity in the system who no longer want to be associated with those who are considered corrupt and nonprofessional. A special role is played by the Supreme Council of Magistrates that must ensure the cleaning of the system from incompetent and corrupt persons. We managed to increase the 2013 budget for justice by 55% and this budget will rise at least until 2016. We never had such a large budget for justice. I’m sure that the reactions from inside will come and we will stimulate them to appear. [Alina Marin, Info-Prim Neo]