À la Recherche Du Temps Perdu: Lack of Serious Involvement by the European Commission in Defending the Rule of Law in Romania

Abstract

The European Commission, often inexplicably ignoring its role offered by the founding Treaties, has shown a lack of serious involvement in counteracting the negative effects of the changes made to the laws of justice in Romania in recent years, its passive role representing at least a moral complicity in weakening the mechanisms of the rule of law. Although there was a Cooperation and Verification Mechanism, established by the European Commission on the date of Romania's accession to the European Union, which received real value and whose binding nature was recognized by the Court of Justice of the European Union, the European Commission generally had anaemic reactions, by publishing the CVM Reports that remained without real effect, although it should and could have guaranteed the application of the treaties. No infringement procedure has been finalized, no action by the European Commission seeking the application of the CVM is pending before the CJEU. On the contrary, the Commission repealed this Mechanism, although the opinions of the Venice Commission remained disregarded by the Romanian state, the solutions of the Court of Justice of the European Union that find effects contrary to the rule of law follow one another rapidly, and the judiciary is under the control of the presidents of the courts, respectively the heads of the prosecutor's office, just as in the first years of post-communism. Unfortunately, Romanian magistrates were forced to do what the European Commission refused. The wave of referrals to the Court of Justice of the European Union represents exclusively the effort of a few judges, taken individually or within professional associations with European standards. They were constantly harassed by the Judicial Inspectorate, their resistance being the only serious form of preserving the rule of law in Romania. The Commission's passivity represents a dangerous precedent because the "step by step" model of destroying the independence of a judicial system can become a source of inspiration for other EU Member States.