President: Justice Minister’s Request To Dismiss General Prosecutor Is “Inadequate”

The president also requested Toader’s resignation for the second time in the past couple of weeks, after previously doing it following a negative Venice Commission report on the country’s judicial reform process.

In a statement published by the Presidential Administration, the president says that he appreciates the activity of General Prosecutor Augustin Lazar.

“President Klaus Iohannis appreciates the activity of the General Prosecutor and considers that the request of the justice minister is completely inadequate and can cause of distrust in the system and concern for our European partners. The way in which the minister publicly presented the report is biased and shows his intention to politically subordinate prosecutors,” reads the statement.

The statement comes after Justice Minister Tudorel Toader announced on Wednesday that he will launch the procedure to dismiss General Prosecutor Augustin Lazar from office, after criticizing his activity in a 20-point assessment.

In the announcement, Toader stated that upon documenting the prosecutor’s nomination for the office in 2016, he found that it a lacked a mandatory review on his recent activity, and that when he requested a copy from the country’s top judicial watchdog, CSM, it was dated one year after the decree which appointed Lazar as general prosecutor.

The proposal has a very high chance of leading to general prosecutor’s dismissal, as a similar request made in the case of former chief anticorruption prosecutor Laura Codruta Kovesi earlier this year ended with the Constitutional Court forcing President Klaus Iohannis to heed the minister’s recommendation, despite initially refusing to do so. The decision also gave the justice minister the sole competency to decide on the reasoning of dismissing chief prosecutors, whereas the president previously had the right to refuse the minister's request.

The assessment will be reviewed by CSM’s Prosecutor’s Section on November 13, although its opinion will be non-binding.

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