Romanian social-democrat “grey eminence” faces arrest in illegal restitutions case

Romanian social-democrat deputies Viorel Hrebenciuc, one of the key people of the Social Democratic Party (PSD), and Ioan Adam are facing arrest, as the National Anticorruption Directorate (DNA) has asked the approval from the Deputies Chamber to hold them in a corruption case of illegal forest restitutions, according to Mediafax. Ioan Adam and Viorel Hrebenciuc are believed to have set up an organized crime group with the sole purpose of having some 43,000 hectares of forests illegally restituted by Romania’s state forests’ administration company Romsilva to a group of private persons. The damage to Romsilva in this care is more than EUR 300 million, prosecutors said. According to DNA, Viorel Hrebenciuc would have received some 12,000 hectares of forests worth some EUR 83 million, had this scheme been finalized. Social-democrat senator Ilie Sarbu, Prime Minister Victor Ponta’s father-in-law is also investigated in this case, for alleged influence trading. Viorel Hrebenciuc, 61, has been one of the most influential leaders of the Social-Democratic Party (PSD) in the last 22 years. An accountant by formation, Hrebenciuc entered politics after the Romanian Revolution in 1989. He first served as mayor of Bacau and then prefect of the Bacau county in the early ‘90s, then he was promoted in the central structures of the party. He was general secretary of the Government from 1992 to 1996, one of the key members of Nicolae Vacaroiu’s cabinet. Since 1996 he has been a member of the Deputies Chamber and currently he serves his fifth mandate. From this position he has been one of PSD’s key people in the Parliament, acting many times as majority whip, or the 'grey eminence' who coordinated the backstage negotiations on many important issues. editor@romania-insider.com