Nikolay Yotov, Bucharest
The Bulgarian Post
2007-01-08 12:10:42

And the first snow silently falls… over Bucharest. Yes. On the third day of the European membership, “zapada” (“snow” in Romanian) has poured over Romania and its capital. There were pouring also comments, appeals and echoes on what should be done in 2007, that has not been done until now and why is it important that the country to be perceived as a key player within the European Union from the very beginning. In the meantime, the snow melted.

The Romanian President Traian Basescu and The Prime Minister Calin Popescu-Tariceanu continued their high leveled wrangle during the brightest celebrations in the country since the times of the Revolution. Very bright, indeed.

Over a million euros have gone for green lasers, colorful kilometric ray lights on the night sky and two festive, hours-long concerts in the heart of Bucharest. Traian Basescu and Calin Popescu-Tariceanu were demonstratively missing each other on the routes of the diplomatic motorcades, having German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier and the EU Commissioner on Enlargement Olli Rehn.

The four of them eventually gathered before the Governmental Palace for the ceremony on raising the EU flag, aligned with the four Romanian ones at Victoria Square little before midnight on 31^st of December 2006. Rushing after that, the President headed towards the University Square, where the main celebration was planned to take place. There, before zeroing the clocks, Basescu held exhausting speech, filled with sensitive patriotism and proud of the fact that namely he is being President of the nation in the moment of its “return to Europe”.

Tens of thousands gathered in two square kilometers and were shuttling between the one concert – at University Square and the other – at Revolution Square.

Tons of garbage and trash were eventually rolling and floating in the air of the cold morning. Until the noon of the New Year’s first day everything was shining clean. Unlike Sofia, here the companies don’t have the priority of fighting the local authorities for this or that, but mostly on money issues.

Romania has obtained a wonderful chance for developing its provincial tourism, since the Transylvanian economic center – Sibiu – has been appointed cultural capital of the Old continent for 2007.

Furthermore, Bulgarian northern neighbors enter the EU as the second largest country in the region. Fact, which recently gave the reason to a high ranked Romanian diplomat to express his opinion, having it that his homeland didn’t have the chance of EU accession in 2004 only because the union could not take them and Poland in the same time. 22-3-million market is yet another reason for the officials here to consider themselves a main player on the financial and economic fields of the biggest trade team in the world.

And while the economic prosperity seems to have a tail wind, political barometer continues to vary in its measures too quickly. With the arrival of the New Year, recently established seceding Liberal-Democratic Party, presented by its leaders Theodor Stolojan and Gheorghe Flutur – Minister of Agriculture, fired by the Prime Minister – expressed for the very first time affinity to the power. The road towards it, however, goes through the “political death” of Calin Tariceanu, who rejected any possibility of preliminary elections in the spring of 2007.

Flutur even said while he was a Minister in his government, he was feeling like part of an “Adrian Nastase cabinet”. Meaning, poorly managed, inclining to corruption. In the meantime it turned out this same man could have possibly “redirected” finances from the governmental aid during the bird flu crisis last summer.

The sad thing is Tariceanu’s ministers now seem to be leaving him without his request. Foreign Minister Mihai-Razvan Ungureanu announced on Monday before Mediafax agency he might be considering leaving the vice presidency of the ruling National Liberal Party.

The shaking in the core are now followed by the complicated situation regarding the border lines of Romania. Citizens of Moldova now need visas, which, even though free of charge, according to the bilateral agreement, still create headaches, combined with the large number of candidates for entering the new EU member state.

On the south, the mayor of the border city of Giurgiu, in a complete Balkan manner, refuses to take down road environmental and transit taxes for foreign drivers. This money continues to be untraceable from the moment they get into the city hall’s cash-boxes. Bulgarians hope that the large discussions, recently involved Romanian Prime Minister himself and Bulgarian European Commissioner Meglena Kuneva’s insistence on the issue will give a new direction of Romania’s perception of the European common sense’s idea.

In the meantime, the snow has melted in less than 24 hours. Unfortunately, it will take more than 24 months for Bulgarian workers to break through more than two thirds of the labor markets in the EU.

How long it will take for the two Balkan countries to percept the European standards of behavior, common sense, different than the ones of “stone age man”, “came from Mars” or “dark Balkan subject” we are yet to observe. We hope for one life time the most.

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