Revocation of Lia Savonea from the top of the Supreme Court, demanded in the streets. Protest announced before the ÎCCJ. “We come with our own indictment”
The president of the ICCJ, Lia Savonea. PHOTO: Inquam Photos / George Calin
Several civic organizations, including Corruption Kills, Resistance, Timișoara Initiative and Romania Initiative, are organizing a protest on Friday, November 14, in front of the High Court of Cassation and Justice, demanding the revocation of judge Lia Savonea from the position of president of the Supreme Court.
The demonstration, entitled “What is Lia doing with the Romanian Justice? – We demand the revocation of the defender of the corrupt!”, is announced through an event on Facebook for 6:30 p.m. in Strada Octavian Goga no. 2 in Bucharest, where the High Court of Cassation and Justice (ÎCCJ) has its provisional seat.
Civil society representatives say that they are taking to the streets “for Justice, for Romania, for the future in which the law really applies!”.
They accuse Lia Savonea of having supported legislative changes that weakened the anti-corruption fight, such as loopholes for the quick prescription and advantages for politicians with heavy cases, turned the CSM into a political tool, intimidated and isolated inconvenient magistrates, promoted controversial people, especially at the Section for the Investigation of Criminal Justice (SIIJ), highly disputed decisions and influencing judicial panels in sensitive cases.
The NGOs also complain that the procedure for appointing Lia Savonea “was started outside the legal term and with a lack of transparency. Declic contested in court the appointment of Lia Savonea because it was made 3 months earlier than the legal term”.
The organizations publicly demand the revocation of Lia Savonea from the head of the Supreme Court and campaign for “an independent, transparent, European justice and oriented to the truth, not to the protection of the privileged”.
“Through Mrs. Savonea's influence, justice no longer belongs to citizens, but to the privileged, and the independence of magistrates has, unfortunately, turned into a bitter joke. We have some recent examples of ultra-controversial files and decisions: ICA, solutions in the cases of Ionuț Costea and Sebastian Vlădescu. We will come with our own indictment, a team of civics and journalists has been working for several days to put on paper absolutely all the elements related to the behavior of Lia Savonea. The Superior Council of the Magistracy is the only body that can dismiss her,” Diana Voicu, president of the Romania Initiative, one of the organizers of the protest, told TVR Info.
Savonea began his three-year term at the head of the High Court of Cassation and Justice in August 2025.
Lia Savonea was promoted to the position of judge at the High Court of Cassation and Justice – Criminal Section in 2023. Previously, she was president of the Bucharest Court of Appeal.
Lia Savonea was a member of the CSM in the period 2017-2023, and in 2019 she was president of the Council. HotNews.ro wrote, at the time of her appointment to the Supreme Court, that she is considered one of the most influential people in the judicial system and leader of the anti-reformist group in the CSM.
In 2023, the Declic community launched a public petition against Lia Savonea, a petition signed by tens of thousands of people, requesting the CSM not to promote her to the supreme court.
