Cav's Place

I’ll start this post with something I should have said at the end of the previous one, namely that the September 8 marches did prompt a reaction from the ruling coalition the next day, when the leaders said that the Parliament will reject the law proposal. However, the Prime Minister not only made it seem that he believed that was the only demand the protesters had, but also stated that there will be negative consequences in case this will happen, starting from damages in the billions that Romania will need to pay to the corporation in question, and it won’t be the Government that’ll pay that price, but all the citizens. The company also issued a statement claiming to ask for such damages, although there is, of course, no basis for such a claim, everything being nothing more than an attempt to reduce the number of people on the streets, as some will end up believing that the matter is settled while others will be too afraid of said consequences to continue.
In addition, RMGC and its allies started yet another massive campaign, filling all the media channels with advertisements promoting the project and staging “debates” between their people and various “leaders” of the protesters that we usually didn’t recognize, said debates often also being moderated by people whose attitude and behavior showed that they also supported the project, or at least had to appear to do so, and featuring their advertisements during every break. This campaign even included ongoing protests in favor of the project, these supposedly being staged by people from Rosia Montana and the surrounding area, some of which are admittedly desperate enough to fall for the dream RMGC sells them, but it’s obvious that a good part of them were brought there by RMGC specifically for this purpose and some were even recognized and proven not to be the miners they posed as.
Later, perhaps noticing that the strategy wasn’t having the desired result, the Prime Minister went back on his word yet again, even making the rather frightening statement that when he first opposed it, back when blocking the project was listed as one of the main points of the coalition’s program, he didn’t exactly know anything about it and was against it solely because the President was in favor. However, his main ally, who had actually been personally in favor of the project all along, continues to state that he is now against it, the result being that a special commission is being created to analyze the matter, delaying any further proceedings even further, obviously still as an attempt to wait until the protests die out.

Day 11: It can be said that the day started with a statement from the Minister of Internal Affairs, who said that “at the first mistake, the first attack, the first stampede, the gendarmes will step in”. This, coupled with the obvious change in the gendarmes’ behavior the night before and the messages that their orders had changed, made it obvious that the wind had started blowing from a different direction. Far from being scared away, however, the core protesters became even more determined as a result.
Still, the day’s protest was rather subdued, with nothing actually happening until 9 PM, when there were barely around 200 people around the fountain, though there were some in front of the Theater as well and the protest against killing stray dogs had also split on both sides, with most people on the Theater side, between the metro exit and the square, but a small group also sitting next to us, beating a drum and having a large number of sheets of paper with slogans printed on them spread in front. Gendarmes were also present in greater numbers, with two negotiators always visible, and in the end they only allowed one side of Elisabeta to be occupied, again after 11 PM, when the reports say the number of protesters had grown to about 700. Everything apparently broke up around 12:45 AM.
The focus during the early part of the day’s protest, before moving to Elisabeta, was on the groups of activists that were to go around the city over the coming days to talk to people directly and spread tens of thousands of fliers, and on discussion groups, three of which being organized around the fountain that day, on legal, archaeological and economic matters, each led by an expert in the field.

Day 12: With many of those who are more involved being around the city, talking to people and spreading fliers, I don’t think more than 50 or so showed up around the fountain. In fact, there were perhaps slightly more across the road, in front of the Theater, and those included some of those who used to be from that crowd but had moved over to ours over the span of this protest. Also there, still between the metro exit and the square, around 100 people continued the protest against killing stray dogs, though some had banners that mentioned Rosia Montana as well.
Eventually, it started raining and everybody rushed into the underground passage, where we were some 200 total, and we remained united after the rain ended and we went back up, continuing the protest around the fountain. The people who led the chants were the usual ones from our side, who acknowledged the presence of those who were primarily there for the dogs but otherwise stuck to our regular “repertoire”. Later, a saxophone player showed up briefly, but everything seems to have ended quietly by midnight, marking the first time when no street was occupied.

Day 13: When Alex, who seemed to be taking over in order to allow Claudiu and Vlad to rest their voices for Sunday’s march, tried to get something started around 8:45 PM, there were about 70 people present. That number grew to perhaps 150 by 10 PM, after which it remained roughly constant, those who arrived even later more or less matching those who were leaving. However, around 30 people gathered in the discussion group regarding archaeological issues and a few never engaged in any way, leaving about 100 to protest. Worse, not even most of those ever gathered in a single group and as time went on they scattered more and more, chatting away as no more than 20 or so were left to still seriously try to actually protest.
Things finally got more interesting around 10:50 PM, when the protesters tried to move to Elisabeta before eventually deciding to march through the Old Town instead, announcing Sunday’s march to the people gathered at the many cafés, bars and restaurants in the area and having their numbers grow to around 200 as a result. Then, after returning to University Square around 11:45 PM, they went back to the underground passage for some more protesting and reminders to call everyone for Sunday. There was an attempt to return to the fountain area around 12:20 AM, but it was raining outside, so the day’s protest ended at that point.

Day 14: The day started at 1 PM, when those who wanted to create signs and banners were supposed to gather and do so, putting together materials and being helped by a few more experienced activists. Later, at 4 PM, the plan called for people to start gathering in three different places and, at 5 PM, fill trams running on four different routes, going to the end of the line while talking to the other passengers and putting signs on the windows. Rather surprisingly for me, this worked out rather well, though there were changes made to the plans on the spot, some of the motormen objected to having their trams filled with signs and at least some groups returned by bus, as far more passengers were on those than on trams.
Later, with Alex initially leading the chants and movements and over 200 attending relatively early, perhaps at least in part due to the fact that it was initially announced that some artists will sing starting from 8 PM, the fountain area saw some more actual protesting, though people still tended to spread out and socialize in small groups. Oddly enough, considering the fact that it was clarified that any singing will in fact take place starting from around 10:30 PM, the numbers started dropping after 10 PM.
Still, the interesting part happened after that time, when a call was made to take to the street, where those from the fountain were to join some who had attended a nearby concert. The gendarmes, present in unusually high numbers, didn’t immediately agree to that, however, and that resulted in quite a struggle, with some protesters being dragged, kicked and punched. Being the first time that happened since the start of the protests, some were scared away by such an outcome, but the roughly 100 who remained sat down on the road and eventually things calmed down, negotiations resulting in the protesters being allowed to stay on one side of the road and nearly all gendarmes leaving the area as the singing started. The street eventually cleared around 12:45 AM.

Day 15 (another video, focused on what happened before and after the actual march, with English subtitles available for what’s spoken): Once again, Sunday brings the big march. Though there were a few independent attempts to organize them again, there were no smaller marches scheduled earlier this time around, so people gathered both around the fountain and across the road on their own starting from 5 PM and kept coming over the two hours before we took to the street. At some point during that time, people from Rosia Montana and Barlad joined us and made a few speeches, the most notable obviously being Eugen David’s.
As far as numbers go, we were obviously far too many for the fountain area at the start of the march, so well over 5000, many saying that we were around 10000. That was only the beginning, however, with 30000 being frequently mentioned later during the march, when it took over 20 minutes to watch the entire column walk past, multiple sources stating that the amount of time had increased to 26 minutes as we entered the final portion of the route. That produced estimates that varied wildly, from the “over 10000” admitted by the television stations with ties to the ruling coalition to some quick calculations done by protesters that resulted in numbers as high as 52000, and this time around there doesn’t seem to be any clear agreement after the fact either, with many protesters still saying we were at least 30000 and many mainstream media sources refusing to go above 15000. Independent reporters, some of whom have spent time watching the crowd from the top of buildings, specifically in order to come up with an accurate estimate, agree that we were over 20000, but they seem to shy away from saying 25000. I will, however, say that something around 25000 seems the fairest estimate as far as I’m concerned, and the organizers also seem to have settled on that number by Monday.
The march itself once again lasted a good three and a half hours if you were part of those first scattered groups that arrived back to University Square, so four hours by the time the end of the column got there as well. We still received support from many people who were in their cars or apartments, though my impression was that it was somewhat less enthusiastic than it had been a week before. However, considering how much our numbers grew over the course of the march, particularly as we walked through residential areas, it’s quite clear that many actually came out of their apartments and joined us, meaning that the support was actually even greater.
Anyone who wanted to catch the metro had to hurry to reach the Square, as the first groups only did so around 10:45 PM, but at least this time there was no question about whether or not the entire area will be blocked, the gendarmes stopping traffic even before the protesters got there and only unblocking one side around 1 AM, when the numbers had dropped to no more than a few hundred. The last people eventually left around 2 AM, these hours spent in the Square after the march making for a calmer night than the one that followed the previous major march. You can say that there was some hostility when some politicians were noticed, but otherwise everyone seemed to get along well; you had music, talking, laughing, no more attempts to push people to continue marching in another direction and even the hostility against the mainstream media seemed to have somewhat lessened.
Back to the march, the organization was still poor, and this time I don’t even know what those who may be seen as leaders did because I very rarely saw any of them even though I ran up and down the column myself, trying to take some pictures, most of which turned out embarrassingly bad. Different groups were still chanting different things, there were thousands of people in front of the large banners and this time they stopped to wait for the others even less, so they ended up in scattered groups spread out over a large area, and there even seemed to be some confusion about where to go a couple of times. Once again, however, everything still worked out quite fine in the end.
To continue following the model I used when I wrote about the previous major march, I’ll once again say that the gendarmes and police worked well with us and I definitely didn’t hear anything about them causing any trouble. The only incidents I know of involved a group of violent individuals who seemed to want us to return to University Square at one point, causing some concern until they were brought under control, some protesters who showed open hostility towards the people working for certain mainstream media channels, and at least one driver that I know of who tried to make his way through the crowd before being stopped by the gendarmes.
All in all, this was proof that, although very few people were still showing up around the fountain in the days leading to this march, the movement is not only not dying out, but actually becoming even more powerful. After 5000 people the first time and 15000 the second time, now we had probably 25000 in Bucharest. In addition, once again there were around 10000 in Cluj, and the list of other places, both across the country and abroad, where protests and marches were staged was once again very long. This truly was the alarm bell that woke up Romania, and I can only hope that what I saw written in an article about the march will remain true over the months and years to come: “The sleeping generation is now drinking its coffee and waking up in a shitty world. It takes a deep breath and starts saving it.”

I’ll end this by mentioning that, while tens of thousands of people were marching against the Rosia Montana mining project, our Prime Minister was in Rosia Montana, meeting with the 33 “miners” who were protesting in favor of the project and persuading them to come out of the old mine they had supposedly spent the past few days in, although those galleries are now a museum that people can visit and the protesters looked suspiciously well groomed for people who had been underground for such an amount of time. On the other hand, the President stated that the law project this all started from is unconstitutional and shouldn’t even be voted on by the Parliament, starting a series of obvious moves meant to take advantage of the terrible mistakes the ruling coalition keeps making regarding this issue, although he has been a firm supporter of the project itself all along.