Cav's Place

December 9: The week started with a particularly visible protest staged Monday morning by Greenpeace, 50 activists from ten countries climbing over the wall surrounding the Parliament building and digging in the courtyard to protest against the changes to the Mining Law which were being discussed by the relevant Parliamentary Committees that day and set to be voted on by the Chamber of Deputies on Tuesday. When the gendarmes confiscated their tools, they even continued to dig by hand until they, as well as a journalist, were arrested and fined, being released later that same day. An activist from Canada required medical attention as a result of the gendarmes’ intervention, being later released from hospital with her hand in a cast.
Otherwise, the two events that took place that evening and, while not directly related to the matter at hand, were announced by some of the known activists were a debate about independent media and citizen journalism that started at 5 PM and a free viewing of No, starting at 7 PM. It should also be noted that, though no other protest was announced and therefore people didn’t gather there again, a large number of gendarmes were present at the University Square fountain during the evening, intimidating anyone who happened to be passing by.

December 10: With the changes to the Mining Law, which not only include most elements originally seen in the special law made for the Rosia Montana project but also ensure that they will apply to other potential projects as well, set to be voted on in the Chamber of Deputies after being passed with no real debate through the relevant Parliamentary Committees the day before and then, completely illegally, modified yet again during the night, an urgent call was made, asking people to gather in Izvor Park, at the entrance that’s across the road from the Chamber of Deputies side of the Parliament building, at 9:30 AM. Everything was done on very short notice because the information only became available particularly late, the schedule that we were aware of almost until the Committees started discussing these changes stating that the vote will only take place on December 16, so there was hardly any time to plan anything.
Under these circumstances, and considering the early hour, it was nice to see maybe some 150 people there by the time we started scattering. Some were even talking of a peak of around 200, but I couldn’t personally check because I arrived there thinking that we should all ask to be allowed inside to watch the vote from the balconies, so I was quick to add my information on the request two activists were already writing at the time, without asking for any details. Much to my surprise, I was the fourth and last to do so, though we found three others already in the lobby when we went to request access and one of them added his name and information to the list as well. Needless to say, I was completely unprepared to be part of what suddenly dawned on me was, more or less, a group of representatives of the protesters, but by then it was too late to back out, so I kept mostly quiet and followed those who seemed to know what they were doing, trying not to look quite as lost as I felt.
In the end, all of that served no purpose because, despite the fact that December 10 is Human Rights Day, they refused to allow us in. We even tried to gain entrance as guests of a member of the Parliament, from PDL, who arrived to help us after Remus Cernea, who was the activists’ first choice, couldn’t be reached, but he was unable to reach the Secretary General either and eventually had to leave us, though he did take two banners and displayed one when he took the stand to speak. He even sent an aide with an invitation from the PDL group, so not only from a single member of the Parliament, but that was refused as well. In the end, Remus, who had also arrived by then, left his own aide with us and went to personally look for the Secretary General, but that didn’t do us much good either because, while he somehow obtained access for a single person, the activist who went inside was stonewalled for another two hours, being told that no staff member was available to escort her, before giving up and going home. The official explanation for all of it was that special security measures were in place because some “gold producers” were in the building, and we also found out that PSD, which is the main ruling party, had reserved all balcony seats the day before, so, on paper, there was no room for any audience, though nobody was actually sitting in those seats.
Eventually, shortly after 11 AM, we left, obviously without the one person who had supposedly obtained permission to go in. Once outside, we found a few more activists waiting for us and wondering what to do next, the first suggestion being to follow the example of the protesters from Cluj, who had occupied the headquarters of PSD, PNL and PDL that morning, and at least occupy the headquarters of PSD as well. However, that would have been an illegal action that’d have served no real purpose, so we eventually returned to the park entrance without having reached a decision. As a positive aspect, having spent all that time away from the other protesters did spare us from being carded and possibly fined, since the gendarmes once again ignored the fact that protests outside public institutions require no notification, but at the same time it caused us to miss some rather creative caroling.
As I started taking some pictures, the others remained some distance away from the larger group and, I imagine, continued to debate, so by the time I looked for them again the decision had been made to occupy the Ombudsman’s office instead, since the Ombudsman and the President can challenge a law adopted by the Parliament at the Constitutional Court. On top of the changes to the Mining Law, while trying to gain entrance we had also found out that the law legalizing lobbying and the poorly written Amnesty Law, which had obviously been meant to ensure that certain important individuals found guilty of white-collar crimes will walk free but, in its current form, would have resulted in thousands of criminals being released, were on the day’s schedule as well, so the plan was to remain there until they will be voted on and, if approved, to demand such a challenge.
What happened next was probably the first real proof that we can act in an organized manner as well, since the message was slowly and carefully spread among the protesters and people started trickling out in small groups, apparently heading in different directions. There were some reasons for concern when some 20 or 30 protesters walked away together, prompting a few gendarmes to follow them, but the fact that the rest of us waited a few minutes before leaving as well and made sure not to repeat their mistake seemed to have fooled them, so there were no problems on the way and, after some quick calls, we suddenly regrouped in front of the Ombudsman’s office, about 100 of us walking in before the stunned guards reacted and locked the door behind us. Some 60 or 70 others, as well as possibly more press than we saw during the big marches at the start of this campaign, eventually gathered outside as well, after word broke out. Unfortunately, I heard that those who arrived too late to join us inside were once again carded and possibly also fined. We weren’t.
Since the offices are upstairs and the guards managed to react just in time to prevent us from simply walking there, we spread out and waited for someone to come talk to us, some moving into the meeting room and getting to work on writing a statement to be released, though agreeing on exactly what to say wasn’t easy. Once someone did come, we made our demands known and were told that at the moment they can’t be met. As such, the next request was for the Ombudsman to come down himself and talk to us, but that was also refused, being instead told that no more than two or three representatives will be received in his office. Since that offer was unacceptable for us, we refused as well and settled in to wait.
Some activists meant to block the doors with furniture and have everyone sit down to block gendarmes from entering, but eventually reason prevailed and, while the discontent was obvious whenever they made an appearance, they were allowed to walk in and out, as were the few people who actually had an audience scheduled that day. The only moment when we did block access was when several gendarmes claimed to want to take something from the back of the waiting room, which made us think they simply wanted to get men behind us as well and prompted a call to sit down and link arms which was immediately heeded. In my opinion, the shouts of “Gandhi” and “Mandela” were rather misplaced at that moment, but they were definitely effective and the gendarmes quickly gave up, some other staff members later arriving to take away a computer and being readily allowed to do so.
Over the few hours we spent there, that feeling that we can be organized definitely went away, seeing as there were plenty of arguments, a few degenerating into shouting matches, either when some known activists insisted on some completely dumb ideas or when some other protesters refused to accept being told what to do and meant to go against a plan just because they weren’t asked nicely enough or given enough time to make their own decision, even if they didn’t actually disagree with the plan itself. On the other hand, the support we had from outside made itself known in the form of water bottles, coffee, oranges, bananas, bagels and pastries which were being handed to us through the window after some activists said we should be prepared to spend the night there. I didn’t personally touch anything, but there was so much food that some of it wasn’t even brought in, being left at the window, and not all that was brought in was eaten, even though at some point at least one worker from there simply sat down at the desk a part of the food was placed on and dug in.
The worst problem, however, was that the bathroom was upstairs as well and we weren’t allowed to use it. If not for this fact, there would have been next to no tensions between us and the guards or the lawyers, despite exchanging press releases by reading them out the window at one point, but as time wore on this one issue became increasingly pressing and resulted in increasingly heated one-sided arguments with an almost completely silent guard. We would have even accepted to only be allowed access one by one and accompanied by guards, like prisoners, and said so early on, then specific requests were made for one person with a handicap, a pregnant woman and an old man, but nothing worked. Their strategy, unfortunately, did, seeing as several people walked out when they couldn’t hold it in anymore, obviously not being allowed back in once they were done, and a few more heated arguments broke out among us regarding the best way to handle the matter.
Fortunately, the office was being renovated at the time, which offered not only an empty room where people could go if they wanted to get some more air or even to make a banner, this latter activity incidentally resulting in a brief moment of panic when somebody thought that the smell of spray paint was in fact tear gas and within seconds the windows were shut and most of us were sitting down and covering our faces, but also the materials to create a makeshift toilet. That in turn caused other arguments, some people wanting to put the piss in bottles and pass it out the window, to be taken away by some of those who were outside, and others being concerned about the image problem that would create, with so many cameras there, so I was under the impression that no agreement to actually use that “toilet” had been reached, but after leaving I learned that several people did their business in it after all.
Either way, after a few hours we learned that voting on the Amnesty Law and on the law legalizing lobbying was rescheduled for a later date and the changes to the Mining Law were, somewhat surprisingly, not approved. The result of the vote was 160 to 105, with 22 abstentions, but such a law can only pass if more than half of the total number of deputies, or more exactly at least 205, vote in favor, and after an extended lunch break during which I’m sure the implications of our action were discussed thoroughly, many didn’t vote at all. As such, we suddenly found ourselves losing the original reason we had to be there and that led to more debates, some wanting to stay in order to bring up the matter of Pungesti as well. Most, however, wanted to leave, especially since at that point we had at most stretched some laws, without truly breaking them, but things would have changed if we’d have remained there past the end of the working hours, therefore this was the decision in the end, although people couldn’t agree on where to go next either.
Before walking out, a call was made to put things back where we found them as much as possible, with the exception of the bucket of piss, which was left for those who forced us to resort to such a measure to deal with. Then, linking arms to reduce the risk of any one of us being pulled away from the group and arrested, we walked out, joined those who had been waiting outside and, after determining that it was probably safe to do so, started marching towards University Square, stopping in front of the Theater because the area around the fountain was filled with gendarmes waiting for us. Once there, after a few more minutes of protesting, people started scattering in small groups, many still looking rather warily at the gendarmes. There was a message shared by one or two activists later, asking people to return there at 7 PM, but when I checked the webcam overlooking the area I only saw a few and not even those seemed to stay for long.
In the end, the day was a small victory for us, both because we proved that we can be organized and efficient if we truly want to and, of course, because those changes would have doubtlessly been approved without this protest, though the President of the Chamber of Deputies immediately announced that he won’t accept this vote as a rejection, so they’ll find a way to repeat it at a later date. However, even that small victory is overshadowed by the fact that, taking advantage of how focused we all were on this one and of knowing that we had only learned of the Amnesty Law and of the one legalizing lobbying while we were trying to gain access into the Parliament, a few other deeply disturbing laws were passed that day, which quickly became known as the “Black Tuesday” because of this.
While I will not go into detail and won’t even claim to fully grasp all the details of these laws, before the end of this post I want to mention that they were also written during the night, without being made public before, were voted on without debate and essentially grant the President, members of the Parliament, mayors and, interestingly, also lawyers immunity from bribery, abuse of office or conflict of interest charges. In addition, it’s my understanding that punishments for some related white-collar crimes that cause losses to the state have been lowered, those found guilty of causing losses of up to €500000 not even facing prison if they return the money. On the other hand, after being decriminalized in 2006, insult and slander are once again crimes, which is a terrible blow to free speech and to the free press, especially considering the fact that the definition of slander doesn’t specify that the accusations need to be false in order to count as such.