Environment Minister Diana Buzoianu dismissed on Friday the director-general of the Romanian Waters National Administration (ANAR) Sorin Lucaci, appointing former head of service with the Arges-Vedea Water Basin Administration Florin Ghita in his place, Buzoianu announced on Saturday morning at a press conference.

'The National Romanian Waters Administration will have an interim director for a transitional period, who has a clear mandate to render the institution transparent and reorganize it,' Buzoianu said, mentioning also that Ghita is a respected specialist with articles published in dedicated journals.

'We want the story of the Romanian Waters Administration to change into one that gives hope that things can change for the better, despite the many irregularities committed here in recent years. Things have to start somewhere, be improved, and today is the moment when we take the first step towards reorganizing, streamlining and reforming the Romanian Waters, in a process that will be a priority for the Ministry of Environment in the coming period,' Buzoianu said.

The reason cited by the minister for sacking Sorin Lucaci was that Romania lost over 300 million euros from the NRRP facility, which would have been essential funding for critical flood defense infrastructure.

'We are talking about over 300 million euros that have been left unused, money that could have been turned into hundreds of kilometers of dikes, into dams and polders, into absolutely essential infrastructure for people to be safe. We have already seen that every year we have floods that kill people, ravage entire communities, and in this context we cannot accept that over 300 million euros have been lost. We all know the discussion, including from the Praid salt mine: there is practically no explanation why in the risk management plans, the flooding of the salt mine was considered to carry just a moderate risk, given that it had been flooded several times already, and the 2023 event - which occurred in exactly the same year when the flood risk plan was modified precisely for that area, was very serious,' the Environment minister explained.

She mentioned that the dismissed director has five days to appeal the decision, but she considers that 'the evidence cannot be denied in any court'.

Diana Buzoianu also brought to mind that a month ago, the Control Body was sent to ANAR to look into the situation of European funding and other issues, including the organizational charts and the way control inspectors and inspections on the ground work, because the Ministry 'wants this document to be a basis for the future reorganization'.

She also specified that there is an official decision set forth in a Memorandum assumed by the government two weeks ago, which clearly states that following the negotiations with the European Commission, despite efforts to save every euro in European funding, the Commission no longer had confidence that the pledged projects could be implemented, because of over 400 km of flood dams, none had been completed.

'Of the 13 dams promised, only one was in the necessary stage that allows its completion by the end of August next year. The same goes for the polders - it's just one of 13, one polder and a dam in Bihor County, where, by the way, the administration decided to separate from the centralized process and this is precisely why it managed to implement the project and keep the Commission satisfied that this infrastructure will materialize. So, today we have an official decision approved by the government, which clearly states what the results of the negotiations with the European Commission were, and we now know that over 300 million euros were lost in the water engineering area', explained Buzoianu. AGERPRES (RO - writing by: Nicoleta Gherasi; EN - writing by: Simona Klodnischi)