The Alliance in power took over two years ago and market research is now reaching a very worrying conclusion: Romanians perceive corruption as the main threat against citizens' safety. What is going on? Has corruption defeated Basescu and Macovei, the self-proclaimed leaders of this struggle meant to restore the law? Did they miss the rendez-vous with the 'pales in Victoria Square'? Or are we to find an explanation somewhere else? After all, what do the way people perceived corruption in 1996 and the way they are perceiving it now share? Mess and small corruption, with 20 million Romanians as subjects. To a less informed reader it may seem allusive that I am connecting the name of Traian Basescu, President of Romania, to the name of Monica Macovei, the Romanian Minister of Justice, in relation to a matter of wide national interest such as the fight against corruption. Is it only the two of them who are guilty of failure? In case of success, would they have been the only authors? In order to reach the right answer we have to know if the entire team who took over two years ago was truly allowed to eradicate corruption starting from the roots, meaning public, both local and central, administration employees only. Leaving details aside, we can conclude that neither the governmental team nor the staff belonging to the Coalition parties had instruments for direct intervention available. One exception is the promotion of the normative documents required by the EU and meant to diminish corruption. Monica Macovei is the exception in governmental team. President Basescu heads the CSAT (Supreme Council for National Defense) and the latter institution's top task is the fight against corruption. The intelligence services have crowded to spy on the suspects and write information against them. Monica Macovei has had prosecutors at her feet. She sacked some and hired some, those now having top positions in the hierarchy. She is a member of the Superior Council of Magistrates, which is the supreme court of Justice. When the officials now in power took over, polls showed that corruption as threat came second. But after two years we find ourselves in the situation we were in ten years ago. There can be only two conclusions: 1. Corruption has indeed grown in Romania - Mrs. Macovei, for instance, was claiming that 80% of judges were corrupted; 2. Something has indeed happened. What can impress citizens so much to make them think corruption is the first threat? There is corruption itself first of all, but not that corruption politicians talks about. It is the so-called small corruption. In Bucharest they started hunting the big sharks, whether real or imaginary, but people have gone through suffering and they feel humiliated because in almost every field administration employees ask for bribe, they ignore citizens' interests or they mock them. This is becoming more and more disturbing as it is growing obvious that Romania can't turn into a prosperous country with poor people who get disdain from authorities. What else can people see? They can see that politicians in power and politicians in the opposition, with the head of state the first of them, compete against each other, blaming each other for high corruption. Governors, spies and traitors, important businessmen chased through Prosecutor's Offices, always pointing to political adversaries, never to their own team. We have therefore got mess, as I have already mentioned. It is unveiling more and more about the real power of corruption itself, just like in 1996.

Sorin Rosca Stanescu