Romanian Labor Minister Marius Budai is resigning after being accused that he ignored a warning about abusive treatment meted out to elderly and disabled people in a complex of private retirement homes in a town on the outskirts of Bucharest, Prime Minister Marcel Ciolacu said on July 13.
In what has become a national scandal with political implications, two Romanian investigative media outlets, Centrul de Investigatii Media (Investigative Media Center) and Buletin de Bucuresti (Bucharest Residence Permit) earlier this month revealed that dozens of elderly and disabled people were being starved, beaten, drugged, tied to their beds, and denied basic hygiene in three private retirement homes run by an organization called St. Gabriel the Brave in Voluntari.
The news sparked a national outcry that snowballed into a scandal with increasing political ramifications when it was revealed that Budai, whose ministry also has responsibilities in the field of social care, had been informed by an NGO about the ongoing abuse as early as last year but did not take any measures to rectify the situation, choosing instead to cut his ministry's official collaboration with the NGO.
As authorities scrambled to close the three retirement homes dubbed the "houses of horror," relocate those interned there, and arrest the owner of St. Gabriel the Brave, Ciolacu rushed to contain the political fallout and ordered a sweeping nationwide investigation of all similar institutions.
More than 1,000 homes were raided by authorities, and 13 have been permanently closed while 43 were temporarily suspended.
Anti-organized crime police detained 26 suspects, and four of them were subsequently arrested while 11 others were placed under house arrest.
Announcing Budai's upcoming resignation on July 13, Ciolacu called it "a gesture of honor" and a normal development "in any solid European democracy."
But his leftist Social Democratic Party (PSD) remained under fire following media revelations that the owner, Stefan Godei, had close ties with Gabriela Firea, the minister of family and youth in the current government and a former PSD mayor of Bucharest.
Furthermore, Firea, who is said to have her eyes set on another mayoral candidacy in Bucharest next year, is married to Florentin Pandele, the longtime PSD mayor of Voluntari.
Both Firea and Pandele have staunchly denied any involvement in the "homes of horror" scandal, claiming they have been the targets of political revenge.
So far, no legal action has been taken against them, but the PSD is likely to incur a serious blow ahead of parliamentary, local, and presidential elections next year.
Speaking in Vilnius ahead of a NATO summit earlier this week, President Klaus Iohannis, a former leader of the National Liberal Party (PNL) that has been in an uneasy coalition with PSD for the past two years, called the revelations "a national shame."