Liviu Pop

Liviu-Marian Pop (born 10 May 1974) is a Romanian politician. He was a very controversial Romanian interim Education Minister in the cabinet of Victor Ponta.

He played a significant role during the plagiarism controversy involving Prime Minister Victor Ponta. A committee responsible for validating academic titles analyzed Ponta's doctoral thesis and unanimously concluded that plagiarism had occurred, recommending the withdrawal of his doctoral degree. In response, interim Education Minister Liviu Pop (PSD) challenged the committee’s authority and rejected its findings, arguing that the session lacked a legal quorum. Notably, Pop had signed an order to reorganize the committee the previous day, but due to procedural timing, the order only took effect during the session in which the thesis was being reviewed. Another committee, subordinated to the Education Ministry, later found that Ponta did not commit plagiarism.

On July 27, 2016 the (Consiliul Național de Atestare a Titlurilor, Diplomelor și Certificatelor Universitare) — reformed by the new Education Ministry — reconfirmed the plagiarism verdict, subsequently requesting the withdrawal of Ponta's doctoral title.

Pop is also known for making very embarrassing grammar, spelling and logical mistakes, for example misspelling the word "knee" in Romanian ("genunche" instead of "genunchi"), or that "mistakes can be fixed, while errors cannot" ("greșelile se pot corecta, erorile nu" ). In 2018 a mistake was discovered in a mathematical manual published by the Ministry of Education. It stated that the number 9 is larger than the number 12. In defense Pop (graduated from the faculty of mathematics and informatics at Babeș-Bolyai University in Cluj-Napoca) publicly argued that this could be the case in another number system, for example base 5. With basic mathematical knowledge however it can easily be proven that this is impossible.