He explained that he has bought the six houses by "honest work" and that the money to purchase them originated either from his own sources – salaries, tutoring, rents - or from money received from his parents and parents-in-law or from loans from friends. In a worsening institutional conflict between the Presidency and the Government, outgoing President Traian Băsescu accused Prime Minister Victor Ponta of serving as an undercover intelligence officer between 1997 and 2001. Ponta dismissed the charge as "all lies". His rival Klaus Iohannis demanded an immediate clarification of the situation, while the Minister of Justice Robert Cazanciuc labelled Băsescu's statements as "campaign statements", and the topic as "ridiculous". Espionage was already a talking point during the electoral campaign. Teodor Meleșcanu, who ran the Foreign Intelligence Service, resigned in September and joined the presidential race as an independent candidate one day later. Around the same time, Robert Turcescu, a popular television anchor, confessed live on air that he had been an undercover lieutenant-colonel for an espionage service and resigned his post. Under Romanian law, outing oneself as a spy is illegal, but prosecutors did not press charges. Members of PMP and PNL expressed outrage over the announced distribution of 18 kg of food to more than 6.5 million people during the electoral campaign, in October and November. In a press release, PNL stated that "in the mad rush for votes for presidential candidate Victor Ponta, PSD doesn't have the slightest reluctance to use EU funds for masked electoral bribe". This initiative was endorsed by the Ministry of European Funds, who published on 20 September a notice of auction in which the Romanian government said it wants to provide 6,652,986 food packages within the Fund of European aid for the most deprived persons. More specifically, over 150,000 food packages would be sent to each county, totaling 100 million euros. PNL argues that the way this auction is organized raises serious questions about its legality. The Minister for European Funds, Eugen Teodorovici, said that EU funds are not used for electoral purposes and any claims of their diversion is "misinformation". President Traian Băsescu repeatedly stated that Victor Ponta "bribes the electorate" and "makes electoral alms from borrowed money". In a press conference critical to Victor Ponta and Klaus Iohannis, Băsescu mentioned the figure of 4.8 billion euros, money that would go towards electoral alms and will be paid by the population.