Stamate: Ask the President Why the Anticorruption Court Is Non-Functional

Olesea Stamate, former chair of the Committee for Legal Affairs, Immunities and Appointments, explained on TV the reason why the Anticorruption Court, created at the request of Maia Sandu in March 2023, is still non-functional. “Well, ask the president why it has not been functional for three months. In October we received the opinion of the Venice Commission on the first amendments, that is, on the first draft law, and I believe that the amendments made in accordance with the opinion of the Venice Commission should be resubmitted to the Venice Commission. If that is done, I don’t know whether it will be done to the March plenary session of the commission, but perhaps the law will be approved and sent to the Venice Commission after that. There were a few exceptions in the case of some laws that needed to be adopted quickly, and then an opinion was required after adoption. However, for most of the laws for which we requested an opinion from the Venice Commission, we requested it before adoption. Every law in the Vetting Package was approved only after two reviews by the Venice Commission. I am not responsible for the security laws, but they were adopted only after the opinion of the Venice Commission, as well as many others. The ones you are talking about are rather an exception,” Stamate said. At the same time, she clarified what the main scope of the Anti-Corruption Court would be. “According to the bill adopted in the first reading, this court will be responsible for corruption cases that come from the Anticorruption Prosecutor’s Office. The bill also provides for the consideration of NIA cases and a few other significant cases that are not within the competence of the Anticorruption Prosecutor’s Office. So, these are mostly corruption cases, but not about bribing a policeman or a doctor for $100. First of all, it will deal with the already accumulated cases. Both judges and non-judges will be recruited for this court, and it is a very good practice to combine the experience of a judge and a non-judge. I believe that the proportion of judges in the court should be more than 50%,” Stamate added.