The Constitutional Court finally removed obstacles standing in the way of cutting magistrates’ special pensions, after a delay of two months, which was seemed like the theater of the absurd at times.
During this period, key institutions in the justice system managed to compromise themselves irreversibly – the Magistrates Council, the High Court and the courts of appeal.
Senior judges led by Lia Savonea, the head of the supreme court, became a public pariah.
The Constitutional Court itself had managed to cover itself in ridicule, considering the five postponements, but often also the reasons behind them. Some judges were even absent from rulings.
All this time, Romania which is the process of recovering a huge budget deficit, left by the Ciolacu government, has seen its access to 231 million euros though the PNRR blocked because it was conditioned on the scrapping of special pensions.
Finally, the situation created by the clique at the top of justice has rekindled public anger with protests almost at the level of the Dragnea-Grindeanu-Iordache-GEO 13 era.
The common sense reform of magistrates’ pensions was a litmus test for magistrates, but also the political class.
And it was a painful test (for some) and a positive test (for others).
The PSD and its boss, Sorin Grindeanu, did not shy away from criticizing Prime Minister Bolojan’s approach, while being inexplicably mild to the clique in the justice system. It is not an exaggeration to imagine that if things had depended only on the PSD and Grindeanu, today’s victory would have been long in the coming, possibly never at all.
The extremist parties, led by AUR and its leader, George Simion, have left the strident impression that the reform of magistrates’ pensions, promoted by the Bolojan Government, is not a priority.
So vocal in promoting parts of the Putinist and Trumpist agendas, on the issue of magistrates’ pensions, our extremists seemed to be playing in a silent movie.
USR, on the other hand, passed this litmus test with flying colors, as did the Liberals, more precisely the Bolojan wing of this party. Because the other wing made tireless efforts in another direction.
It is worth remembering, in this context, that, despite the complexity of magistrates’ pensions, the unity around its president was not the strong point of the PNL.
In parallel with the front opened against him by the clique at the top of justice, Ilie Bolojan has found himself in the last two or three months (coincidentally?) with a hostile front, on various topics, targeted by a part of his party. Maybe to distract him from the really huge stakes.
However, the Bolojan method was ultimately the winning one. It was a winner because it had become obvious both in the eyes of public opinion and in the eyes of European partners that the enemies of the Bolojan method were not building a competitive alternative, but were destroying the only truly competitive working option.
It is telling that decisive for the success of Bolojan’s reform was the overnight change of judges in the CCR. Judge Mihai Busuioc, a senior figure proposed by the PSD admitted that on Wednesday he tipped the balance.
“I voted, yes. I’m the bad boy,” Basil, declared on Wednesday, for Observer.
It should be noted that Judge Busuioc had at one point been among those who left a CCR meeting on the subject of magistrates’ pensions, which is why the CCR had to postpone a decision lacking a quorum.
Can we exclude the hypothesis that the level reached by the theater of the absurd ultimately created panic at the top of the Social Democrats? I don’t think we can rule out such a hypothesis.
So, it seems that at the last moment Grindeanu considered he had to choose between a risky road to a dead end and an uncomfortable path towards a damage control strategy. And he chose the latter and he did well. Maybe, although we don’t have high hopes, he will have learned something from the stinging experience.
There are four major implications that emerge from the ruling.
- The Savonea group can quietly declare bankruptcy. She had a strategy that failed, but above that, her strategy compromised the image of the entire body of magistrates in Romania. I was writing As early as October, the story of the special pensions, in case it ends with the failure of the Savonea camp, may become an opportunity to trigger a spectacular phenomenon: the collapse of the junta that seized the judiciary. Of course, it depends to a great extent on the body of magistrates and the fact of openly confronting their chiefs, and the fact of putting in place something completely different, and not the same kind of people and the same networks. Of course, a not insignificant contribution to such a project can be made by parties and civil society.
- Ilie Bolojan and the party group coagulated around him won a major political victory on Wednesday. And it is added to a precious capital obtained at the beginning of December, through the electoral victory of Ciprian Ciucu, supported by Bolojan, in the elections for the Bucharest City Hall. In the extremely difficult economic and social context, as well as in the no less turbulent context of the ruling coalition, the success of the reform of magistrates’ pensions blows fresh wind in the sails of the Prime Minister and duly cuts off the PSD-Grindeanu momentum.
- We would also benefit if President Nicușor Dan is now open to optimizing his own vision in terms of his relationship to PSD-Grindeanu and to the “Bolojan method” – less understanding of the first case and more of the second.
- A more propitious path is opened for scrapping other special pensions.
Romania’s top court finally validates law to curb magistrates’ super pensions
