Today, April the 19th, 2019, at the headquarters of the Ministry of Internal Affairs was held an evaluation session on the activity for 2018, in the presence of the MAI leadership, the heads of the directorates and the general inspectorates.See below the message of the Minister of Internal Affairs, Carmen Dan:”First of all I want to greet my colleagues in the territory. I also thank the press because it is with us to present the ministry’s activity for 2018. As I said every time we met and when we analyzed the activity of each ministry structure, the moment of results is when we review the good things we have done and account for our achieved goals, but it is also a moment when we also recognize we have not done so that we can continue to be determined in achieving the goals we ourselves have set.The last structure of the MAI that presented its results was the Romanian Police, and this happened on the 25th of March this year.We have recently completed all the material on the overall activity of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, so we wanted to meet today in this formula and not in a festive way as you may have been accustomed with, in order to know all of you the central elements of 2018 and priorities of 2019.I would like to inform about the full version of the evaluation of the Ministry of Internal Affairs activity has been sent to all the beneficiaries stipulated by the law, including to the CSAT.Therefore, we can say that 2018 was an extremely complex year, a year marked by challenges, changes, and a year in which we have taken steps forward to solve the problems this ministry faces for some time and which have a direct effect upon citizens’ safety.Sometimes we have succeeded; in other cases we still have to work upon it. We have found that some changes, however beneficial would they be, may strike some resistance from some people. This does not mean we have to give up on projects initiated in 2017, namely: reducing staff shortages, logistics investments or purchasing protectiveequipment.I will not give up and I am convinced that I have the support of all people in good faith in this endeavor.In 2018 we had as main objectives: to increase citizens’ safety, to improve public services, to manage emergency situations, to strengthen EU-level partnerships with a view to taking over the Presidency of the EU Council, to reduce staff shortages and to provide logistical and financial resources for the smooth running of the MAI’s activities.As far as the first objective of increasing the safety of the citizen is concerned, 2018 was the seventh consecutive year in which we have been decreasing in terms of offenses committed and perceived.
Also, with regard to the fight against violent serious crimes, they are at a level similar to the previous year, but I would like to say, for example, that the degree of offenses of murder is 98.7%. More than 70% of the offenses have been reported as blatant, which shows us that police and gendarmes were on the streets at the right place and time, where they needed it. In the context, street offenses, including robberies, declined in 2018 by more than 12 percent from 2017.As far as road safety is concerned, I can tell you that serious accidents and road deaths were fewer than 2017, but the number of road deaths is still high.As I have done since the beginning of my mandate, I have not been involved in any way in the operative activity of the MIA structures, but I have tried to get as many funds as possible in order to improve the working conditions, equipment, protection, so that people can do their work best.And for the results achieved in increasing citizens’ safety, the merit belongs to all colleagues in the public order structures.I still urge all MAI employees to be firm and equitable in enforcing the law, but also to assume with dignity and responsibility all the consequences of their actions.And because it came into discussion the responsibility issue, I’ll give you an example from the Road Police Department. It was said at some point that the head of the department would be investigated because his subordinates had taken the driving licenses to public figures or politicians.I want to eliminate any ambiguity and to mention that the disciplinary research that has been spoken about in the media, and which has not yet ended, has as its main object the scandal of the license plates.What is the director being accused of is that he participated in the Road Safety Working Group which amended the Geneva Convention provision, which established the possibility of using registration numbers composed only of letter combinations, and when, in Romania, the Traffic Police had to make a fair decision on such a case, you saw what was the result.I do not talk anymore about the fact that he did not inform the General Inspector of the Romanian Police about this issue when he was asked to take a decision on this issue.Why, for more than 6 months, could not complete a disciplinary research? This is another issue that concerns the totally ineffective way in which this legal construction of the police’s disciplinary liability is regulated.Specifically, there are many situations in which disciplinary research is suspended for up to one year – the term of decree prescribed by law – through all sorts of tricks that may indicate including bad faith, such as medical leaves. It is not the time now, but I will be speaking more broadly on this topic on a future opportunity, but at the same time I warn the ill imagined patients that I have prepared a set of measures in order to solve this problem, too! And I’ll give you another example. We are in the same situation with Police Queastor Voicu. Soon, the one-year procedure will be completed, which will lead to the impossibility of applying any sanction for the faulty way in which he handled the pedophile’s situation.Regarding the state border situation, efforts have been focused on combating illegal migration and cross-border crime, but also on fluidizing the transit of vehicles and persons at border crossing points to reduce the waiting time.
With regard to combating tobacco smuggling, more than 4.7 million packs of cigarettes worth over 41 million lei were seized in the past year and 18 organized groups consisting of over 160 people were identified and destroyed.In 2018 there were more than 33,000 public order assurance missions and more than 20,000 interventions in support of citizens, with about 15,000 offenses reported. Most of them, these public events took place without incidents, with only one exception that marked the activity of the Gendarmerie last year: the protest of August the 10th. The fact that the other protest actions, before and after August the 10th, took place without incidents is the proof that the Gendarmerie did NOT intend violent actions.At these events where peaceful protesters agreed to dissociate themselves from the actions of the aggressive, the gendarmes handled the situation very well with punctual interventions to remove and sanction those who produced and incited acts of violence.Some believe, regardless of the arguments presented, that the gendarmerie’s intervention was abusive and nothing would change their perception.I can accept that there were also punctual actions of some gendarmes who acted disproportionately. There are images in this sense and nobody can deny them.But I think everybody has to answer for his deeds and we must not stigmatize an entire institution for that.I also believe that the truth will be established, according to the law, by judges following investigations made by prosecutors and I cannot agree with the public condemnation of people and institutions just for the sake of political discourse.There has been much talk about this topic, even now, at more than 8 months from the 10th of August; it is still in the news. Some people have gone through their own filter what happened then, as a proof that the gendarmerie is on the third place in the institutions that Romanians trust, after the army and the church, according to the surveys. And I do not refer to polls ordered by the MIA or the Gendarmerie! We’re not dealing with that!And I take this opportunity to clarify an issue that has sparked a lot of discussions in the public space: The one of declassifying some documents.Following a request by the General Prosecutor’s Office directly to the Central Structure of the MAI to declassify 8 documents with reference to the action of August the 10th, 2018, a Commission was established, according to the Decision no. 585 of June the 13th, 2002 for the approval of the National Standards for the protection of classified information in Romania, in order to analyze the appropriateness of their declassification.Following this analysis, the committee decided that a single document could not be declassified because it was a summary of a document from another institution in the defense, public order and national security system that did not agree to its declassification.The other 7 documents were declassified entirely or partially, i.e. over 90%. There are less than 2 classified tabs out of the total of 25, as these were summed up.I repeat: it is about the requests directly addressed to the ministry, and I am not aware of it, nor is it normal for me to have it, other requests from the Prosecutor’s Office to other structures in or outside MIA.
A last piece of information on this subject – Data for which classification was kept came from other structures or institutions that did not agree to their declassification.All documents that have been declassified entirely or partially have been submitted to the prosecutor’s office on January the 31st and constitute evidence in the file.I invite all those interested in these documents to request them from the Prosecutor’s Office, because only prosecutors can determine whether the evidence in the file can be made public or not.From now on, any attempt by the Prosecutor’s Office, in the sense that the MAI has not declassified the documents and therefore cannot complete the investigation, will be considered susceptible to untruth! As I have already said on other occasions, the institution I represent is the first concerned with the clarification of issues relating to the 10th of Augustevent. All the more, the Romanian Gendarmerie, against which genuine denigration campaigns have been initiated and there has been added pressure throughout this time.I have repeatedly asked my question – what happens to the August the 10th file? I want everyone to understand that the Interior Ministry should not answer this question, but the Military Prosecutor’s Office.The Ministry of the Interior did its responsibilities for this case to be completed. I recommend the General Prosecutor’s Office to seek guilty people by evidence and not by apologize! By changing the registry, I am convinced that you know that an essential component of the work of the Ministry of Internal Affairs is saving people’s lives at risk: surprised by dangerous weather phenomena, fires or man-made disasters, accidentally or not.Thus, in 2018 MIA structures for emergency situations intervened in 436,000 cases, representing an average of 1,195 missions per day, the average response time being about 12 minutes.2018 was a year in which we were able to acquire the necessary equipment and techniques to manage major disasters.We continue, this year, also to increase the endowment level. Among other things, we are in the process of purchasing 10 light helicopters and 12 heavy and medium ones. Last year, the procedures were also started for the acquisition of a maritime vessel and three river ships that will serve the Danube and the Danube Delta. Two ships for CBRN interventions have already been delivered to Constanta and Olt.This year, we should have the auctions finalized, and starting with next year we will begin our receptions.We have also been assured that in the first semester of this year, we will complete the revision of Cessna’s engines.This plane has been on the ground for more than a year and a half, but we have the necessary money and the optimal procedural solution has been found, so there would be no reason not to be operationalized and used as it was in the interest of the people.
Also in this area of emergency situations, last year many more exercises took place, like SEISM 2018, and this type of actions will also continue in 2019, as you saw last week.All these exercises bring with them, better prepared people and a more effective reaction in emergency interventions.A less spectacular component of our activity, but very important for citizens, is the issuing ofidentity and travel documents and vehicle registration and driving licenses.2018 was the year in which we succeeded in simplifying the procedures for issuing these documents, reducing bureaucracy, shortening the waiting time, and creating better conditions for people in need of community-based public services.We have succeeded in doing this through the operationalization of new headquarters, the adaptation of the work program by introducing the shift service, the use of the Romanian Post courier service for the transmission of documents, the addition of the number of examiners in the case of driving licenses, the shortening of the issue of simple passports electronics from 30 to 15 working days and extend the validity of passports to 10 years.Last year, over 1.7 million passports were issued for Romanian citizens, more than 2 million ID cards were issued, more than 1 million driving licenses and more than 560,000 vehicles were registered.2018 was a very important year for international relations and European affairs for the Ministry of Internal Affairs.It was the year that I dedicated to preparing for the first time the takeover of the Presidency of the Council of the European Union by Romania.Meetings have taken place with the chairmen and vice-presidents of the coordinating working groups, and not few, as well as representatives of the Council General Secretariat, from the European Parliament and the European Commission, for discussing organizational issues.Also, in 2018, Romania assured the Salzburg Forum presidency, focusing on priority areas such as migration, asylum policy and internal security.At the same time, the Ministry of Internal Affairs represented Romania in international peacekeeping missions under the auspices of the UN, OSCE, EU and NATO. 133 police and gendarmes were involved in these missions.The year 2018 was remarked as one of investments from non-reimbursable foreign funds. At the MIA level, 225 projects funded by non-reimbursable external funds amounting to more than EUR 396 million are in implementation. At the same time, 99 requests for funding, still in the evaluation stage, were submitted, amounting to more than 216 million euros.Regarding the human resources issue, 2018 was the first year of the last six, in which the number of persons employed was higher than those who left the structures of the MIA.
We continue the policy of reducing staff shortages and we have come from nearly 25% of the deficit in 2016 to about 10-15% earlier this year.Regarding the financial and logistics issue, in 2018 we focused on ensuring the mobility of the police forces through the acquisition of motor vehicles which were distributed as follows: for the police – 1,642, for the gendarmerie – 639, for the firemen – 344, for the border police – 225, and 204 were assigned to other structures of the Ministry of Internal Affairs.I will now make some clarifications regarding the salaries of the ministry employees to have the picture from December 2016 – when I took over the government until now:- The minimum net salary of a debutant police agenthas increased since December 2016 by 57%. In real numbers, this means from 1,373 in 2016 to 2,167 today. This is the minimum wage – that is, for an early career agent. To this salary is added the standard payment for food, the amount for equipment and various gains or compensations (night hours, work on days off, etc.)- The minimum net salary of a non-commissioned gendarme sub officer has increased by 56% since December 2016. In real numbers, this means from 1,340 in 2016, to 2,097 today. To this salary is added the standard payment for food, the amount for equipment and various gains or compensations (night hours, work on days off, etc.)- The net minimum wage of a debutant police officer in the operating area has increased by 44% since December 2016 to this date. In real numbers, this means from 1,551 in 2016 to 2,240 at present. To this salary is added the standard payment for food, the amount for equipment and various gains and compensations (night hours, work on days off, etc.)- The minimum net salary of a gendarme officer has increased since December 2016 by 54%. In real numbers, this means from 1,459 in December 2016 to 2,268 at present. To this salary is added the standard payment for food, the amount of equipment and various allowances or allowances (night hours, work on days off, etc.).These increases led to:MEDIA salary for police agents to increase by 33%, from 2,124 in December 2016, to 2,824 currently, apparently without food norms, equipment amount and various gains and compensations (night hours, work on days off, etc.). MEDIA salary for police officers to increase by 23%, from 3,456 in December 2016, to 4,259 at present, with all officers with executive or management positions entering this calculation.Ladies and gentlemen,Obviously, as presented in the results material, the main milestones of this year, from the point of view of the general interest, are the proper organization of the electoral processes, ensuring the security of the events brought by the Presidency and the historical visit of the Pope in Romania – which will be a series of events involving a large number of people.
In addition to these large-scale events, the objectives of 2019 remain the continuation of the policy of reducing staff shortages, the continuation of the process of acquisition of means of mobility for operational structures and the acquisition of protection means for employees.These priority projects are possible because the MIA benefited from an additional budget to the previous one, 2019 being the second consecutive year with a budget increase of over 20% over the previous years.All of the issues involved in allocating these important financial resources to the smooth development of our missions would not have happened if I did not have the support of the parliamentary majority.I am a political minister and I want to thank the President of the party, the Prime Minister, the Government and Parliament colleagues. The Governing Coalition Chairmen supported me unconditionally, both in terms of budget allocation and support for legislative projects to improve our missions.The government has always addressed the problems of this ministry with interest. We are always in the spotlight, through our activities, but also the toughest critics will have to admit that in these years of the PSD-ALDE government in the interior ministry was givensomething, it was not cut anything!And I firmly believe that this minister deserves respect for society, because in the center of our institutional interest lies the citizen, with his problems and needs, this desideratum being the one around which the Governance Program was built.Because we are already in April this year, in addition to the internal objectives structured at the end of last year, new priorities have emerged, and there are some issues that I would like to mention now:One priority concerns the efficiency of how we act for missing persons. More specifically, I have encountered various situations in which children, elderly or sick people have never returned home, lost or simply left home voluntarily. Families obviously worry about and report to the police the disappearance. Here’s the problem.At the time when almost every child or elderly person has a mobile phone, state institutions cannot use modern technologies to locate such a vulnerable person, because in case of disappearance, a criminal case does not automatically open and, without a file, the technological means provided by the criminal procedure cannot be used.And all this in the country where all kinds of protocols, mandates or localizations or compliances are discussed for any kind of situation, but less for when the lives of our children or our grandparents are in danger.So, we are working on a bill law project to enable the authorities to use these means for the disappearance of these vulnerable people for whom any delay in finding them presents a risk for integrity or life.The bill law project is about to be next month under a public debate.
Another topic, which already has a certain public interest, is that in the future there will be some organizational changes at DGA level.DGA’s activity has two main components – preventing and combating corruption. I think there must be a balance between these components. We support prevention when we demonstrate that we have the ability to fight.I have recently requested the General Director for a projection on the future organizational framework, starting with two findings that we have had over the activity of the directorate in last year.The first concerns the fact that DGA’s activity on the prevention area has focused too much on other areas other than the MIA.From my point of view, I do not think we have finished with corruption in the ministry to prioritize our preventive work in other areas of social life (education, health or administration).The second observation concerns the operational area and the figures are relevant: in 2018 the DGA investigated about 1,500 suspects, of which only 174 are MIA employees. That’s just over 10%.The remaining 90% of the activities mean that it concerns other areas, based on delegation from the Prosecutor’s Office.I can understand the mechanism of delegation from the Prosecutor’s Office, but we must not forget that this unit was set up, first of all, to handle the problems of the MIA. As long as the ministry still has issues of integrity, we cannot ignore the meaning for which this structure was established.I sincerely inform you that I am thinking of acting in a legislative way to bring back the DGA’s activity to the area of competence for which this unit was set up.MIA needs such an integrity structure and not another Parquet! This year, I requested for a much more applied approach to prevention policies developed by the National Anti-drug Agency. The findings in the annual reports are worrying when looking at the drop in the age of those who consume drugs. And we cannot respond to this trend with campaigns that consist of leaflets!So, we have requested that in the short term we have a new vision of how the Agency will take preventive actions. I asked this from the new leadership, because, my dears, in the interior ministry nothing is got easily – it took us almost two years to remove a faulty management from the National Anti-drug Agency.Another topic that came to our attention is that of doctorates. In the context of starting the evaluation process of doctoral studies at the Police Academy, I considered that the imposition of integrity rules towards employees who receive this allowance cannot be limited to those who have obtained doctorates in the Police Academy.
In this respect, we initiated the amendment of the Minister Order, which will ensure that all over 500 employees holding the PhD degree and receiving the doctoral degree comply with the condition laid down by Law 153/2017, i.e. that they are working in the field for which they hold the title.In other words, I do not think it is normal for a policeman working in the operative area and having a doctorate in mechanics, for example, to benefit from that doctoral salary paid by the MIA.It seems to me right for the institution to pay the doctoral grant if the employee’s studies can be capitalized in the activity he provides for the institution.We all want skilled and well-trained employees, and this over-qualification in the field of business means that we should be rewarded. However, the employer cannot pay for the fact that an employee completes his doctorate in an area that has nothing to do with the work he is doing.And in order to have the full size, it should be mentioned that the MAI currently pays for the doctoral bonuses over 550,000 lei per month.Personally, I would prefer to use an annual sum with at least as many figures for the rehabilitation, construction or renovation of spaces as is appropriate for our work.The activity of the MIA is extremely complex and carried out for the benefit of the citizens.I have realized the synthesis that I have presented to you so far just to remind you how important this ministry role is in the architecture of the Romanian state, but also in the European dimension it manages.Beyond the budget, logistics and other aspects of our activity, I want to emphasize that the most important resource the Ministry of Internal Affairs has is the people!That is why I allow myself to appeal to you now, to respect the people in the Ministry of Internal Affairs and to support them in their work as we all can do it.Before I conclude, given that we are here all decision-makers at national and territorial level, I urge you very much to apply the measures provided in the approved MIA plan for Easter and the 1st of May holidays.We all want to prevent serious incidents so that Romanians can spend this free time.On this subject, I will ask the General Inspectors of the Police, the Gendarmerie, the Border Police and the Fire Brigade to have a few punctual interventions.(…………………………………)It is also important to note that on April the 27th the campaign for the European Parliamentary elections begins, which will most likely double by a referendum.I invite the State Secretary for Relations with the Prefect Institutions to briefly present the state of the organizational process. (…………………………………)Finally, for those who celebrate the Easter on Sunday I wish them a quiet holiday, and to those who celebrate their Day of the Flowers Holiday, I tell them a warmly Happy Birthday! Thank you all for your attention! „
