By Dennis Deletant for Contributors.ro. originally published in Romanian.
Upon returning from Cluj in October 1988 to Bucharest, my father-in-law, Andrei Caracostea, a professor at the Institute of Construction and Engineering, offered me the unexpected opportunity to meet Ion Iliescu.
Iliescu was, at that time, director of the Technical Publishing House, with which my father-in-law had a contract for the publication of the Manual for the Calculation of Constructions, second edition, the first edition of which had appeared in 1977. My father-in-law asked me to take the manuscript to the publishing house that was based in Casa Scânteia, built after the model of the Lomonosov University in Moscow and nicknamed “The Wedding Cake” because it symbolized the post-war “union” of Romania with the USSR. Built between 1952 and 1957, it housed the offices of the party’s daily newspaper, Scânteia, and other state-controlled newspapers and publishing houses, being financed in part by sums deducted from workers’ salaries. A statue of Lenin had been erected in front of it, who, perhaps fittingly, stood with his back to this temple of culture. This is where the main publishing houses that published literature, literary publications, as well as the printing house of the Communist Party’s daily newspapers, Scânteia and România liberă were housed. I knew the building and, after telling the reception why I had come, I took the lift to the office where I had business. I timidly knocked on the door and a woman’s voice invited me in. I explained the reason for my visit, my relationship with Professor Caracostea and I handed over the manuscript. “I’m going to see if the director is in the office. I’m sure it’s a pleasure to thank you again.” She knocked on the door and disappeared inside. After a minute, a radiant Iliescu appeared with her, with his hand outstretched to welcome me. “Many thanks for bringing the manuscript, Professor Caracostea is one of our most valuable authors. But come to my office, tell me a little about what you do.”
Iliescu’s political trajectory was a mystery. He was a former party leader in Iasi county, between 1974 and 1979, had been marginalized by Ceausescu, and rumors circulated in the West that he had enjoyed the sympathy of Mihail Gorbachev, a rumor that gained credibility after the enigmatic call for reform made by Iliescu appeared in the newspaper România literară, in September 1987. Discretion was the dominant part of our conversation. Over a cup of ersatz coffee, made from chicory which was popularly known as nechezol, I spoke briefly about my academic concerns about Romania and about my interest in finding out first-hand what the daily problems of citizens are. He nodded approvingly. I never imagined that our next meeting would be in early January 1990, after he had become president of the National Salvation Front. He recalled my visit before the revolution and was kind enough to stay with me for a few minutes, asking me about my father-in-law, before he gave an interview to the BBC. When my father-in-law died in 1993, President Iliescu sent a wreath.
The biggest threat to Romania’s fragile democracy and rule of law after the revolution was the the National Salvation Front’s use of miners as “shock troops”. The Jiu Valley coal miners made several incursions into the capital, the third in June 1990, when they were invited by President Ion Iliescu, newly elected through democratic elections, under the pretext of defending the FSN government. Special trains brought 10,000 miners to Bucharest, armed with wooden sticks and iron bars, at dawn on June 14. They were accompanied by others who were later identified, from credible sources, as former Securitate officers. For two days, the miners (helped and encouraged by the Securitate) terrorized Bucharest, attacking anyone who in their eyes was an opponent of the regime.
The miners’ invasion of Bucharest, to which Iliescu resorted in order to restore authority, significantly weakened both his and Romania’s image abroad. In July 1990 I received an unexpected invitation from the presidency, signed by Mr. Iliescu, to participate in Cotroceni with several representatives of the Romanian diaspora in a debate on the image of Romania. The relevance of the questions posed to Iliescu was doubtful, especially since the subject of the ‘mineriade’ was skirted around. A Romanian living in Vienna complained that he could not find strings there for his violin and asked the president to get him some. Iliescu, with a smile on his face, replied that he would undertake the necessary measures. Along with two Romanians living in Italy, I personally criticized Iliescu’s contribution to the miners’ strike, reminding him that on June 15 he summoned the miners to a rally, marking their ‘victory’, to thank them. I added that the miners’ invasion was reminiscent of the tactics used in 1945 by the communists in Romania and other parts of Central Europe to undermine the democratic order. Mr. Iliescu did not comment. After the debate closed, the Romanian television interviewed several participants but bypassed the two Romanians living in Italy and me.
Five years after the revolution, I had the opportunity to meet Mr. Iliescu again. I was invited by BBC television to accompany John Simpson, the chief foreign news correspondent, to make a documentary about the evolution of Romania since 1989. Among those interviewed was President Iliescu. When I entered his office in Cotroceni, he received me again with a smile and asked me about my mother-in-law and family. He had a very good young Romanian translator, although he spoke in Romanian with me. After the interview he offered us a coffee, joking about the fact that in 1988 when he received me at the Tehnica publishing house, he had nothing to offer but nechezol.
It was a great pleasure for me to meet him again in March 1999 at the University of St Andrews in Scotland where I was among those invited by Professor Gavin Bowd to a conference on France and Romania. President Iliescu addressed the audience in the plenary session and at the end of his presentation many Romanian students asked him questions about the still unsolved “mysteries” surrounding the Revolution (for example, who shot at the demonstrators and on whose orders, if there were “foreign fighters”, if foreign intelligence agencies were involved then and the subsequent ‘Mineriade’). After he answered them, I approached the podium where he had been speaking and when he saw me, he stretched out his arms, grabbed me and said, “it’s good to see a familiar figure, don’t you want us to have dinner?” And so Professor Bowd invited us to a Chinese restaurant with a French professor and the president’s bodyguard. At the restaurant, Mr. Iliescu insisted that I sit next to him – Professor Bowd, the French professor, and the bodyguard sat at the other end of the table – and for three hours we feasted. I decided to ask the president if he would mind if I asked him to tell me something about his youth, the time he studied in Moscow, his career in the party and his relations with Ceausescu. Mr. Iliescu replied that he didn’t mind at all and spoke very openly. It was an extremely interesting and instructive evening for me.
Ion Iliescu remained for me a consistent, approachable and invariably smiling person.
