Romanians protest in Bucharest and Cluj, asking the Ombudsman’s resignation

Over 1,000 people in Cluj-Napoca, central Romania, and around 200 in Bucharest took to the streets on Wednesday evening, asking for the resignation of Romania’s Ombudsman, Victor Ciorbea. A few people also protested in other cities such as Constanta, Vaslui, and Iasi. In Cluj-Napoca, people marched the streets chanting slogans such as “Victor Ciorbea don’t forget that we want your resignation today,” or “The law is for all, not for the mafia only.” In Bucharest, people gathered in Universitatii Square where they chanted similar things, asking for Ciorbea’s resignation. The protests were triggered by Victor Ciorbea’s recent decision to challenge at the Constitutional Court the law that doesn’t allow a person with a criminal conviction to become a member of the Government. The law prevented Social Democrat leader Liviu Dragnea from claiming the position of Prime Minister after his party’s victory in the December 11 parliamentary elections, due to his two-year suspended sentence. Although Ciorbea said that his decision to challenge the law was not related to Dragnea’s case, people perceived the measure as being a move that would clear the PSD leader’s way to becoming the country’s Prime Minister. Moreover, besides the protests, Romanians also signed an online petition that asks the Ombudsman to resign. The petition gathered some 144,000 signatures so far. However, a few days ago, Victor Ciorbea said that the civil society’s requests to resign are unfounded, and those who initiated the petition are not well informed. “Poor people that don’t know what’s this about and didn’t have the patience to read the exception of unconstitutionality I made,” he said on Tuesday, reports local Digi24. The protests that took place in Romania on Wednesday evening were organized on Facebook. Irina Popescu, irina.popescu@romania-insider.com (Photo source: Grigore Cartianu on Facebook)