Romania Gambling Regulator Gets New Chief as Corruption Probe Continues
Valentin-Ioan Tomescu has taken over Romania’s gambling regulator at a particularly difficult moment for the institution.
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His appointment as president of the National Office for Gambling (ONJN) replaces Vlad-Cristian Soare, who held the position for just over a year. The change was formalised through Prime Minister Ilie Bolojan’s Decision No. 283/2026, published in Romania’s Official Gazette.
No reason was given publicly for Soare’s removal.
The leadership change comes while corruption investigations are still hanging over senior figures at ONJN, adding another layer of uncertainty to a regulator already undergoing major reforms.
From Enforcement to the Top Job
Tomescu is not new to the institution.
He previously headed ONJN’s South-East Territorial Service in Constanta before moving to Bucharest and joining the General Directorate of Supervision and Control.
That unit sits close to the regulator’s enforcement work. It oversees inspections of gambling operators, compliance with licences and authorisations, and the sanctions imposed when rules are breached.
His career inside ONJN therefore gives him direct experience of the machinery he will now lead.
Soare arrived in the top job last May, after an audit found that the regulator had failed to collect around €1 billion in taxes from gambling operators. His tenure was marked by attempts to tighten the institution’s operations and modernise parts of Romania’s gambling framework.
Among the changes was a nationwide digital self-exclusion system covering online operators. ONJN also obtained roughly €5 million in grants for projects addressing gambling-related problems through the Conscious and Free programme.
The regulator took a harder line against unlicensed activity as well. Around 1,300 illegal gambling websites were blocked, while the number of licensed operators fell sharply, from about 200 to fewer than 100 as the market consolidated.
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Romania also moved against prediction-market platforms including Polymarket and Kalshi.
Those measures unfolded alongside efforts to improve transparency and accountability inside ONJN. The Court of Auditors acknowledged progress in those areas during Soare’s tenure.
Soare Questions His Removal
Soare has not presented his departure as a routine change of leadership.
In a LinkedIn post, he said he had not been given an explanation for the decision and expressed disappointment that the change had not been based on merit. At the same time, he made clear that he intended to remain supportive of Romania and the public service.
He also pointed to the internal investigations launched during his mandate.
Soare’s account was that his administration had changed the leadership of several directorates, opened internal inquiries and referred suspected wrongdoing to criminal investigators. He connected the ongoing Anti-Corruption Directorate investigation at ONJN with serious violations that, in his view, conflicted with the direction he had sought to establish at the regulator.
The investigation itself predates Tomescu’s appointment and involves senior figures at ONJN. The available material does not establish that Soare was implicated in wrongdoing.
That distinction matters as the regulator changes hands.
Tomescu now inherits an agency facing scrutiny over its past performance, pressure to enforce Romania’s gambling rules and an unresolved corruption investigation inside its own ranks. His previous experience is firmly rooted in the enforcement side of ONJN.
The question for the new president will be whether that experience translates into a more stable regulator — and whether the reforms begun under his predecessor continue after the change at the top.
Source: www.iredellfreenews.com
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