IMPARȚIALITATE·INTEGRITATE·EFICIENȚĂ
September, 6th, 2016
No. 1162/VIII/3
Press Release
The prosecutors within the National Anti-Corruption Directorate – the Territorial Service Ploiești ordered the start of the criminal action and the judicial control measure for a period of 60 days, starting with September 6th, 2016, against the following defendant:
PONTA VICTOR VIOREL, when the deeds were committed president of a political party, who was charged with the offences of:
- the use of influence or authority in order to obtain for himself or for another person money, goods or other undue benefits,
- complicity to the offence of money laundering.
The ordinance drawn up by the prosecutors shows that there data and indicia leading to the reasonable suspicion describing the following state of facts:
In order for a businessman to be appointed as a candidate on the lists of a political party, in an electoral college where the political entity was certain to obtain the respective mandate, Ponta Victor Viorel, as the president of the respective political party, made use of his authority in order for the proposal concerning the candidature of that businessman to be endorsed. The endorsement of the proposal was made by Ponta Victor Viorel in order to obtain undue benefits, consisting in the payment of the amount of 220,000 euro, that was obtained through middlemen, from the same businessman.
This money was needed to organize a visit in Romania of a foreign political well-known person. Ponta Victor Viorel was interested in winning electoral votes, by making public several events in which he participated together with the respective well-known person with international notoriety, under the circumstances in which, during 2012, according to the electoral timetable, local and parliamentary elections were to be carried out.
The entire event was settled to be organized through a nonprofit and nonpolitical organization, inducing the idea among the public that the meeting between the foreign public person and Ponta Victor Viorel would have taken place as a result of the foreign public person’s initiative. Thus, the visit of the former foreign leader in Romania would have not appeared as being made at the initiative of the political party.
For this purpose, Ponta Victor Viorel together with the businessman requested the representative of the nonprofit organization to find a way through which the foreign politician be invited in Romania without disclosing that the initiative belonged to Ponta Victor Viorel, and the payment relating to the organization of the event be incurred by the businessman through a commercial company controlled by middlemen.
In this respect, in order to dissimulate the illicit origin of the sum of 220,000 euro, the defendant Ponta Victor Viorel accepted, following an understanding with the businessman, the conclusion of two contracts.
As a result of the receiving of the undue advantages consisting in the payment of the sum of 220,000 euro needed to obtain electoral votes, Ponta Victor Viorel endorsed the businessman as the candidate of the political party, within the electoral college from Prahova County.
The endorsement of the list containing the proposed candidatures for the position of Senator or Deputy, forwarded by the county or district organizations of the political party, falls within the remit of Ponta Victor Viorel, as a president, according to the political party statute.
Moreover, following the elections, the respective businessman was appointed Deputy in the Romanian Parliament.
It is worth to mention that there has been a practice in the Romanian politics according to which the financial powerful people can easily accede to elected positions of public dignity. They are promoted by the leadership of the political parties with the immediate and direct purpose of ensuring the illegal financing of the political parties during electoral campaigns.
In this context, since the law of the political parties and the electoral laws clearly set forth the way in which the political parties and electoral campaigns are financed, this fraudulent mechanism causes serious damage to the democracy which requires ab initio that the people acceding in public dignity positions be elected by the people in accordance with the principle of representativeness, based on criteria of professional competency and probity.
Concretely, any payment made under these circumstances constitutes an undue advantage as long as it represents the condition for the accession on the candidate lists within a college ensuring the mandate.
The defendant was informed about his criminal status and the charges brought against him, in accordance with the provisions of article 309 of the Criminal Procedure Code.
During the time of judicial control, the defendant has to comply with the following obligations:
- to present himself at the premises of the National Anti-Corruption Directorate - the Territorial Service Ploieşti or at the premises of the trial courts, whenever he is summoned;
- to immediately inform the judicial bodies with respect to the change of the residence;
- to present himself at the General Directorate of Bucharest Police – Judicial Surveillance Office, according to the surveillance timetable drawn up by the police or whenever he is summoned;
- not to leave the country, except with the previous approval of the competent prosecutor/judge;
- not to have close contact with other people mentioned in the ordinance and not to communicate directly or indirectly with them, in any other way;
- not to make statements in mass-media related to the subject of the case or comments about the prosecutors investigating the case, to the other people investigated in the case, as well as to the witness heard in the case;
- not to hold, use nor carry weapons.
The defendant was notified that, in case of violation of his duties of the judicial control in bad-faith, the measure of judicial control can be replaced by the measure of home arrest or pretrial arrest measure.
It should be mentioned that the criminal action represents a stage of a criminal trial regulated by the Criminal Procedure Code, a situation which cannot, under any circumstances, infringe the principle of presumption of innocence.
THE INFORMATION AND PUBLIC RELATIONS OFFICE