With anger and bitterness about corruption
RBJ, January 15, 2003
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We cannot say that since its setting up, about 12 years ago, and up to now, the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (E.B.R.D.) has ever adopted a hostile or even critical or caviling attitude towards Romania. On the contrary, E.B.R.D. has developed with every passing year a friendly relationship with Romania.
The about $2 billions invested so far in various business projects in the most diverse domains - industry, agriculture, energy, transports, constructions, town planning and so on - are the evidence of a series of normal relations established with E.B.R.D. and, obviously, advantageous for Romania.
It is from this point of view that we must "read" and estimate the "Report on transition in 2002" presented, last week, in Bucharest by the E.B.R.D. chief economist, Willem Buitter, focussed on the Central and East European countries, as well as on those affiliated to the Community of Independent States. The positive appreciation contained by the Report are well known: Romania has registered a number of major progresses as compared to last year in its economic development and the results of the reforms have started to emerge: the Gross Domestic Product has increased, in 2002, by 4,5% and next year all the conditions have been created to register a growth exceeding 4% under the conditions in which the average growth witnessed in the other countries of the region is of 3,5%.
However, a bank well known for its rigour, such as E.B.R.D., could not make a realistic analysis without including a number of critical points mainly referring to the quality of the business environment in Romania. The analysis presented by E.B.R.D. chief economist focuses its basic information on Romania, on the restraint of the foreign investors to approach the exciting business opportunities provided by the Romanians. "Although the direct foreign investments exceeded, in 2002, $1,2 billion, their share is still very limited in the Gross Domestic Product," Willem Buitter pointed out.
This is a reality well known and experienced by for many years and none of the governments which have succeeded to each other at the helm of the country could correct it. That is why, the only thing we have to do is to accept this new ascertainment and, watching once again with bitterness the statistics, to try and realize if the appetite of the foreign investors is further substantially low towards Hungary, the Czech Republic, Poland, Slovenia.
Why?
The answer is peremptorily given by E.B.R.D. chief economist: because the older obstacles have been maintained on the road of each serious, redoubtable investor - the legislative instability, corruption and bureaucracy. The details of the "E.B.R.D. Report" are unfortunately both bitter and real. We have perused the Report at random and here it is what we found among other things: "Corruption is a much more serious issue in Romania than it is in the other candidate countries. The latter remains a problem, a genuine challenge both for the business community and for the Government;" "From the total number of the foreign companies interviewed, it has resulted that although a lower number of the latter were bound to give a bribe, however, the sums offered by them have increased;" "The private companies paid at an average 2% of their total sales in Albania, Azerbaidjan, Moldova, Romania, Kazakhstan, Kirkistan, Tadjikistan;" "Although corruption is part of the business life in these countries, this is not something you should get accustomed to live with;" "It is not enough to adopt a special legal framework for the eradication of corruption, you must get sure that the laws are enforced, that the people involved are independent from the rest of the Government and that they are correctly paid. You must effectively fight corruption."
We also read with bitterness these pitiless conclusions reached by E.B.R.D., an institution which has expressed, as we have already said, a friendly attitude towards Romania. Romania maintains itself in the eyes of the world in an extremely delicate position because of corruption. We are openly told it or we are pointed at, in this respect, in turn, either by the representatives of the European Union or of NATO and now by those of the prestigious European Bank: Romania has been included on the black list of the countries with the highest degree of corruption and bureaucracy. Bribery, graft, the hidden commissions have become working "instruments" to which the investors or businessmen desperately resort to if they further obstinate themselves in developing business projects in Romania and who are harassed by obscure civil servants, who have got very high positions in the decision making domains starting with the counties and ending with the center of the country.
This situation cannot be tolerated any longer but only with the risk of entirely compromising the big fights waged by the country. However, something has somewhat started to move, launching at least a few tangible signals that the fight against corruption has been unleashed. The "Pavalache affair," "The Dabela affair," "The S.R.I. colonel-lieutenant Carali affair," the "Satu Mare mayor affair" and so on and so forth are only some of the examples that point to the fact that the National Corruption Prosecution has exceeded the exploration period and has finally unleashed the attack. However, it would be an error to leave the difficult moments of the fight against corruption only on the shoulders of the National Prosecution Office. "The "hot" stones of corruption should not be taken out from the "fire" of these horrible habits only with P.N.A. hands. Corruption has become generalized in Romania. It has practically reached all the fibres of the involved institutions, in an way or another, in the domain of notifications, enforcements and approvals, of the bidding organization, of the appointments in a high office. The impression has been created that everything can be sold or purchased outside the boundaries of law.
It is only at the time when the Government and the political structures of power, on the one hand, and on the other hand, the qualified institutions - Police, Prosecution, financial squad, the special investigations bodies - will pass to a generalized offensive not only at central level but also at the level of each county, of each city and even at the level of each village, that we can expect tangible results to be reached, in the corruption curbing domain. The local business gangs, the mafia networks have penetrated, as it could be witnessed during the latest arresting operations, the safest institutions of the state - through the cases of corrupt police officers, of corrupt officers affiliated to the Romanian Intelligence Service, of corrupt prosecutors, of corrupt judges, of corrupt mayors and so on.
The fight unleashed against corruption has become a national cause. If we want to save Romania's honour and if we further want to step on the road leading towards NATO and the European Union, it is first all the people in power that must definitely understand this ultimate truth.
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