Role Of Conflict Of Interest In Romania

Conflict of interests and incompatibilities soon to become history in Romania?!

Conflict of interests and incompatibilities
Conflict of interest appeared once with the public service itself. But for many years in many societies, it wasn’t viewed as an impediment. A conflict of interest is not easily defined because standards of morality may differ from country to country, even from person to person, and also our standards have evolved over time. In modern societies, public officials are expected to act exclusively in the interests of the state and the public. As societies, evolved, democratized and their governments became accountable, the citizens expect public officials to “discharge their duties in the public interest and with fairness

For example, a public official involved in making a decision in which he/she has a private-capacity interest may act fairly and according to the law, and consequently there is no corruption involved. Another public official could take a bribe (corruption) for making a decision he/she would have made anyway, without any conflict of interest being involved in his/her action (OECD-SIGMA, 2007b: 6). In this context a conflict of interest is not necessarily corruption or fraud. However, it constitutes an “abuse of public office for private advantage” and may hold a potential for other corrupt behavior.
Conflicts of interest fall, generally, into two categories: pecuniary and non-pecuniary interests. (ICAC, 1996; see also OECD, 2003)
Pecuniary interests involve an actual or potential financial gain. The traditional bribe - money, cars, houses, excursions, etc., or involvement in businesses where shareholders are one’s members of the

It’s a real proof that the ideas of “conflict of interest” and “incompatibility” are actually new for many Romanians, unheard of in the communist era, and unaccepted by the political class.
ANI was many times impeded by politicians. Since it was created the institution, it has faced permanent legislative, budgetary and political attacks. It was never a priority for the Romanian officials. As a confirmation for this statement we can look at the low number of integrity inspectors working at the National Agency for Integrity through the years.
Source: National Agency for Integrity
The number of inspectors decreased in 2010 and 2011 to almost 60% from the original start in 2008. It is a worrying fact if we consider that 2012 has been an electoral year, with two elections (local and parliamentary). As a comparison, the figures went down from 53 in 2008, also an electoral year, to 35 in 2012. But the number of cases didn’t decrees were just longer to process. And we have a great amount of cases both in the Conflict of interest area as in the Incompatibilities area. See Graphics 1 and 2. Graphic 1 - Source: National Agency for Integrity Activity Report 2016
While in the case of incompatibilities the number is almost