Romania’s digitalisation minister resigns after plagiarism accusations

Florin Roman, vice-president of the centre-right party PNL, resigned from his position as research, innovation and digitalisation minister on Wednesday after journalists found several irregularities in his resume and proof he plagiarised his academic work.

The resignation came after media reports that prime minister Nicolae Ciuca called on Roman to clarify his situation, following a series of articles published by the newspaper Libertatea questioning his academic work.

Florin Roman quit less than a month after he was appointed as minister. Lacking prior experience, he claimed that not knowing the subject of his portfolio was an advantage because some ministers could favour their businesses if they have expertise in the respective sector.

However, he claimed in his resume to have written a book on information systems, but journalists could not find the book in the National Library, while the publishing house said they had not published any book written by Roman.

Afterwards, he sent journalists 10 pages from his master’s dissertation, identical to pages from the course materials of a university professor from Timisoara.

But the final straw seems to have been the inclusion in his resume of a bachelor’s degree he did not obtain.

Florin Roman said in a Facebook post that he resigned so that the scandal surrounding his resume would not affect the government’s work. But he accused Dacian Ciolos, the leader of USR and the former chair of the Renew Europe group in the European Parliament, of “coordinating” a denigration campaign.

“Florin Roman is not a victim. (He) is an exponent of the Romanian political class who destroyed what Romania had best,” Ciolos said.

Roman is not the first high-profile politician accused of plagiarism. The current prime minister is under suspicion as his PhD thesis could not be found by journalists, while most of his doctoral studies would have had to have taken place while he was serving as a military officer in Afghanistan.

In an official statement, the government said that the PM’s studies were spread over several years and the presentation of his thesis was delayed by a year because of the Afghanistan mission.

(Bogdan Neagu | EURACTIV.ro)