Cav's Place

The title comes from the fact that not much happened during this month that passed since the previous “protest report”, but also from the flash mob that took place on April 17, when about 20 people gathered in front of the University Square fountain to raise awareness about the fact that about three million lambs are slaughtered in Romania for Easter, simply because that’s the tradition. Since this movement or the known activists weren’t involved, I only learned about it when I saw a couple of others post a few messages after the fact, but I will include the event here because the issue is important, and because I wrote about it before as well.

What many known activists were busy with on April 17 was the event that marked the end of that exhibition I mentioned before, which opened on March 27 and aimed to be a retrospective of the protests that started last September, the plan after that date apparently being to take at least some of the signs and banners, not sure if other materials as well, and start something of a tour of the country. Other events that took place in that location during the period covered by this post, being considered as part of the exhibition, were debates on April 8, 10 and 15, and one other concert on April 11. It’s also possible that this and the one on April 17 weren’t the only concerts during this period, but they’re the only ones I’m aware of.
Otherwise, some activists made the best of the “Scoala Altfel” (literally: “School, Differently”) week, which started on April 7, by organizing a series of workshops about activism in general and Rosia Montana and fracking in particular in a number of high schools. This was obviously an important development and I should be writing far more about it, but pretty much all I know is that it happened and that, according to a few brief messages, not only students but also some teachers showed great interest.

Moving on, the group that focuses on the issue of fracking organized two events during this period, namely a protest on April 25, starting at 7:30 AM, and a discussion on May 5, starting at 6 PM. According to a few pictures I saw, probably around 15 people attended each time, a message about the protest also stating “at most 20”. I also gathered that, though said protest was scheduled to last for up to two hours, it ended sooner than that, those who did attend scattering relatively quickly.
In between those two events, on April 26, a group of NGOs, most of them representing cyclists, launched the “You Are the Traffic!” campaign, part of the “Green Roads Bucharest” project, by taking the Bucharest version of the “Space Taken By 60 People” picture. This was done between 10 and 11 AM and traffic was obviously stopped on that portion of Victoriei Way during this time, the event being authorized. Then, starting at noon, people were invited to cycling lessons in Izvor Park, those who were more experienced being asked to teach those who wished to learn.

Finally, a somewhat more significant protest was supposed to take place tomorrow, on May 7, when the law that it all started from was to finally be rejected. Of course, that’s a mere formality, especially since most of its relevant aspects are being moved to other laws, so the idea was to remind the politicians that they’re not fooling us. However, an announcement made this morning stated that all votes will take place today, so those who were able to change their plans were asked to do so and gather today at noon instead. Since a few proposals that’d have banned fracking were to be rejected today as well, this may have avoided any potential conflict between those focused on this issue, who may have wanted a protest to be organized today from the start, and the rest, but at the same time ensured that very few were able to attend.
For the first time since April 6, I actually went, but considering the extremely short notice it was almost 12:45 PM before I managed to get there. However, me and the perhaps 20 others who did gather simply wasted our time, everyone scattering only a few minutes after I arrived, when it was announced that no laws will be voted on today due to a lack of quorum, though some reports state that enough Deputies were actually present. After all, the elections for the European Parliament are coming up on the 25th and politicians want to avoid any decisions that may hurt their parties’ chances, not to mention that they were also supposed to vote on whether to allow the arrest of an opposition Deputy who is currently facing corruption charges and any outcome was likely to make them need to offer explanations they obviously don’t care to offer, especially during the campaign.