Radio România Internațional

Tag: trade unions

  • May 30, 2016 UPDATE

    May 30, 2016 UPDATE

    PRINCE CHARLES – Romanias President, Klaus Iohannis, on Monday received in Bucharest HRH, the Prince of Wales. The focal point of the talks was the mission and the role played by the “The Prince of Waless Foundation Romania, an educational charity launched in Romania last year, which aims to support heritage preservation, Rosia Montana, agriculture and sustainable development. During the talks, the Romanian President reiterated his wish and readiness to support initiatives meant to preserve and improve Romanias natural and cultural heritage. Also on Monday, Prince Charles met with PM Dacian Ciolos. In recent years, Prince Charles has frequently visited Transylvania, where he purchased, restored and refurbished several properties and where he spends some of his vacations. He has a well-known fondness for the medieval Saxon architecture in central Romania- citadels, fortified churches and houses- built by ethnic Germans who settled down in Transylvania, in the Middle Ages.



    ELECTIONS – Romania on Monday entered the last week of campaigning for local elections, scheduled for Sunday. Over 250,000 candidates are running for mayoral positions, as well as positions in local and county councils. Also campaigning are candidates for sector council or the General Council of the Municipality of Bucharest. For the first time in post-communist Romania, there will be only one round of voting, a move that was strongly opposed by civil society and the press, who claim that elected officials will lack legitimacy because of poor turnout. Pundits say, however, that this election may clean up local administrations, marred or discredited by a large number of corruption scandals. Last year alone, prosecutions commenced against 14 municipal mayors, nine county council presidents and one prefect. In Bucharest, the general mayor and four of the six sector mayors were detained on corruption charges.



    TRADE UNIONS – A new round of negotiations between the technocratic government in Bucharest and trade unions in education ended with no results on Monday, after the two sides failed to reach an agreement on the pay hikes demanded by the unionists. Trade union representatives have announced they will stage a protest march in Bucharest on International Childrens Day marked on June 1. The cabinet had proposed an average salary raise of 5%, as of January 1, 2017, but the unionists declined the offer, deeming it insufficient.



    NATO – NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg on Monday started a two-day visit to Warsaw, for high-level meetings with Polish officials. The talks revolve around the organization of the NATO Summit of July 8-9 in the Polish capital, which comes against the backdrop of mounting tensions with Moscow. Previously, fresh from the meeting of the NATO foreign ministers, Stoltenberg had said the Alliance does not wish for a new Cold War, but that the message to Russia was clear: any attack against one of the allies is an attack on the entire North Atlantic Alliance. On this occasion, Romanian Foreign Minister Lazar Comanescu called on NATO to pay more attention to the Black Sea area, which has been the seat of some of the greatest security challenges in the last few years.



    BRANCUSI – Over 129,000 Euro have been collected in donation so far for Brancusi’s sculpture “The Wisdom of the Earth, as announced Romanian PM Dacian Ciolos on Monday. This is not much, the premier admitted, but he said he hoped the money would be gathered by May 19, the end of the fundraiser. The Culture Ministry hopes to gather six million Euro by September 30. Ciolos recently announced he would donate his own salary for the month of April to the cause. Starting Friday, the ministry accepts donations by text message, telethons, online contributions, public tender, special events, as well as by wire transfer.

    CORRUPTION – 77 oncologists from Bucharest and
    seven Romanian counties are prosecuted for bribe taking. According to the
    prosecutors, they reportedly received financing to attend an international
    congress in 2012 and to spend a vacation in India, from a pharmaceutical
    company. The main aim of the company’s move was to convince doctors to
    prescribe or to recommend to their patients medicines produced by the
    respective company. The total cost of the vacation exceeded 520 thousand Euros, of which 416 thousand Euros
    are considered bribe by the prosecutors. (That is 5,400 Euros for each of the
    77 oncologists). Also, prosecution for bribe giving has been started against
    people in key management positions of a company dealing with the import,
    distribution and promotion of pharmaceuticals.



    TENNIS – Romanian Simona Halep, 6th seeded, and Australian Samantha Stosur, 21st seeded, on Tuesday will resume the game in the eighth finals of the Roland Garros tournament, interrupted on Sunday by rain. It continued to rain in Paris on Monday, too, and all matches have been rescheduled for Tuesday. Halep leads in the first set 5-3. Also in the eighth finals in the women’s singles, Romanian Irina Begu was eliminated by American Shelby Rogers. In the men’s doubles, the Romanian-Indian pair Florin Mergea/ Rohan Bopanna won on Sunday their game against the US- New Zealand pair Brian Baker/ Marcus Daniell, also in the eighth finals.



    FOOTBALL – Romania’s national football team was defeated in Turin, Italy, on Sunday night (3-4), by Ukraine’s national team, in a preparation match for the European Championship to be held in France next month. On Wednesday, in Como, the Romanians tied 1-1 against Congo. On June 3 Romania will play in Bucharest against Georgia, in the last preparation match before the final tournament. In Paris, Romania will meet the host team on June 10, in the opening of Euro 2016. Also part of Group A are Switzerland and Albania.


    (Translated by Calin Cotoiu and Diana Vijeu)

  • The Week in Review, 23-29 May, 2016

    The Week in Review, 23-29 May, 2016

    Prime Minister Dacian Ciolos pays official visit to Washington


    US vice-president Joe Biden received at the White House Romanian Prime Minister Dacian Ciolos. The Strategic Partnership between the two countries and economic cooperation were the main topics on the agenda for talks, along with preparing the NATO Summit of Warsaw in July. Joe Biden has reiterated the United States support, both at bilateral and at NATO level, to consolidating security and defense in the Euro-Atlantic area. Prime Minister Ciolos has called on the US to deploy a NATO-led multi-national brigade on Romanias territory in order to strengthen the security of NATOs southeastern flank. Joe Biden highlighted that Romania has been and continues to be a trusted ally and partner of the United States, referring to both countries interest to access the untapped potential for developing the economic cooperation between Romania and the US. Dacian Ciolos also discussed with other Washington officials and with representatives of the US business sector, whom he encouraged to invest in Romania. The Prime Minister also met with members of the Romanian community.



    New Health Minister for Romania


    Ensuring cheap and effective medication in hospitals and reducing the incidence of hospital-acquired infections are among the priorities of the new Health Minister, Vlad Voiculescu. The Romanian official wants to use European funding to build three regional hospitals in Iasi, Cluj and Craiova. Vlad Voiculescu also wants to change management contracts, investment plans for hospital laboratories and to improve the Ministrys control mechanisms. All these measures, Vlad Voiculescu argues, are aimed at restoring patients trust in the Romanian healthcare system.



    Negotiations continue between trade unions in the education sector and the Government


    Negotiations between the Romanian Government and trade unions representing the education system continued this week. Previously, the Government had proposed an average increase of 10% in the salaries of the teaching staff, to come into effect starting August 2017. Unionists have rejected the Governments offer regarding the budget allocations to education, which they see as insufficient. Trade unions say that unless an agreement is reached at the forthcoming round of talks, they would stage a rally in Bucharest on June 1. In turn, Labour Minister Dragos Pislaru has announced that the implementation of the Governments ordinance on adjusting the salaries of some 6,000 employees in the education sector starting January 1, 2017 would entail a financial effort worth 800 million lei.



    NATO to focus on the Balkans


    NATO officials plan on focusing on the Balkans at the forthcoming NATO Summit to be hosted by Warsaw in July. NATO Assistant Secretary General Sorin Ducaru says Montenegros NATO accession could create the premises for restoring stability in the region. NATO is currently facing the most complex challenges and risks since the Cold War, coming from the east and the south, Sorin Ducaru added. Romania currently has 690 military deployed in NATO operations abroad.



    Bucharest hosts plenary session of the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance


    The working definition of anti-Semitism was adopted at the plenary session of the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance hosted by Bucharest between May 23 and 26. Romania is holding the presidency of this Alliance from 2016 to 2017. The 31 member states of the Alliance reconfirmed through this decision their commitment to observing the Stockholm Declaration and to making efforts to fight anti-Semitism. 240 experts and decision makers talked about policies and projects in the field of education, research and Holocaust remembrance from the perspective of their contemporary political relevance.



    Romania does not agree with amending the EU directive on posted workers


    Romania does not agree with the modification of the EU directive on posted workers, the Romanian deputy prime minister and minister of economy and trade, Costin Borc said in Brussels. He pointed out that the Romanian workers should not be discriminated against. The European Commission has proposed the modification of the ceiling for salaries to which posted workers are entitled. The current directive stipulates that posted workers have the right to a minimum salary. 11 EU members have expressed opposition to the modification of the directive. Given the circumstances, the European Commission has to revise its proposal or to withdraw it.



    Cluj is the venue for the Transylvania International Film Festival


    The 15th edition of the Transylvania International Film Festival- TIFF has opened in Cluj Napoca, in western Romania, with the film “6.9 on the Richter scale screened for the first time in the presence of its director, Nae Caranfil. 248 productions will be screened until June 5. For the first time at the TIFF, the film “Dogs, winner of this years critics prize at the Cannes Festival, will be screened. The special guest of the 2016 edition of the TIFF is actress Sophia Loren, who came to Romania for the first time. She will receive the Lifetime Achievement Award.

  • Social Problems and Union Discontent

    Social Problems and Union Discontent

    Romanian healthcare trade unions picketed a few days ago the Prefect’s offices in several counties as well as the Parliament Palace in Bucharest, to demand that inequities in the public healthcare sector be eradicated and that the system be properly financed. They are dissatisfied with the fact that negotiations on the new salary law have been suspended, and want 6% of the GDP earmarked for public healthcare and new rules for the operation of consulting rooms in schools.



    In the north-eastern Romanian city of Iasi, more than 300 employees from public education, healthcare, local administration and tax agencies, protested in front of the Prefects Office. The leader of the Iasi branch of the “Fratia trade union confederation, Ioan Pascal, pointed out that discontent had built up since 2010, when salaries had been cut down by 25%, and that the latest draft law generated significant imbalance in terms of salaries across the public sector.



    Iulian Cozianu, head of the “Sanitas Iasi trade union, added that, considering the current price level in Romania, salaries should be raised by at least 25%. Healthcare personnel demand holiday and night-shift bonuses and want the hiring freeze in the sector to end. In turn, the Prefect of Iasi County, Marian Grigoras, said he would forward the unionists lists of demands to the relevant structures in the Government.



    Equally disgruntled were scores of miners and energy workers from the Oltenia Energy Complex in south-western Romania, who walked 300 km to Bucharest, in a protest march. Two years ago, massive redundancies were initiated to downsize the companys 15,000-strong workforce, and a further 2,000 people are to be let go this summer. The miners hope to convince the Government that mining in this area is worth carrying on.



    The Energy Minister Victor Grigorescu has said the Oltenia complex is not insolvent and the Cabinet will find solutions for the financial recovery of the company. He had talks with the management and employees and agreed on a plan to improve the efficiency of the company, which requires, among other things, a personnel restructuring scheme.



    Meanwhile, some hope that the situation of the company might improve through a partnership with a major Chinese corporation. Oltenia officials say that a new thermal power plant could be built in Rovinari, in three years time, in a partnership with the Chinese state-owned company Huadian Engineering. The project requires investments of one billion euros. At present, the Oltenia Energy Complex is one of the corporations that generate huge losses for the state budget, although four years ago it was reporting profits. The unit is able to cover nearly 30% of the electricity demand of the country, but the prices it charges are three times higher than those asked by other suppliers in the market.



    (Translated by: Ana Maria Popescu)

  • Trade Unions in Communism

    Trade Unions in Communism

    The Romanian communist party, with direct support from the Red Army, grabbed power in Romania across the board in the years immediately following WWII. One of the mechanisms it used was trade unions. Before the war, these were workers associations created in earnest. They tended to be left leaning, as they were all over Europe, but this didnt affect their true purpose.


    After 1945 everything was about to change, including trade unions. Lenin called trade unions the ‘conveyor belt of the Communist party, sending decisions to the people. In other words, the unions translated the will of the party for people who were not politically engaged. Unions were rallied to the cause, and the party used them to control most material benefits that workers had. This was so pervasive that it became a source of jokes. One popular joke said that the Communist party member eats without paying, while the trade union member pays without eating. Vlad Nisipeanu was an apparatchik who held important positions in the union movement. In a 1999 interview recorded by the Oral History Center of Radio Romania he spoke about the relationship between the party and unions:



    “At first, the party had few members, and if you were not a party member, you were a union member. You paid your dues, and you were given tasks from the party through the union. The head of the union was a member of the party, the party chairman for the city was in the Party City Office, the head of the factory party organization was in the management of the factory, everything tied in. It wasnt a job for just anybody. Some unions were allowed to give people a home provided by the party. Sometimes the party could not fire you, because sometimes unions could countermand such a decision. The unions sent you to professional training courses, granted you financial aid, or subsidized vacations. The unions helped people get promoted, get raises, they were a force to be reckoned with.



    While it was compulsory to be a member of a trade union, this was a form of control of the work force, but that also meant a lot of money to go around, thanks to the dues. Here is Vlad Nisipeanu again:



    “Trade unions had a lot of money, dues were 1 or 2% of the monthly salary, and the country had 6 or 7 million union members, so you see money was piling up! It didnt even get spent. Trade unions were wealthy. I had a good life with the unions, because I was not very politically engaged. I was in the union international section, and I was great. I was talking to Poles, Czechs and Bulgarians. I spoke Russian pretty well. I went to Moscow a few times, I went on delegations to Warsaw, to Czechoslovakia, in all the Soviet bloc countries. They sent me to Korea in 1963. You could also write in the press through unions, they had a newspaper called “Labor. The union movement was a force to be reckoned with, and it was used by the party as such.



    Romanian unions also held congresses, and quite often they invited communist activists from Western countries. Vlad Nisipeanu recalls a young female activist from Chile:



    “These congresses were attended by Westerners as well. I remember a journalist and union activist from Latin America, from Chile. She said that she could not say she was traveling to a communist country, so she asked for a visa for Spain or France, then she came here. It so happened that her name appeared in the newspaper the following day. I tried to cut it out of the copy, but there were pictures too. And then there was another problem. My folks, who waited for all the guests at the airport to take them to the hotel, did not see that her passport got stamped. What was she supposed to do? She was liable to get arrested for traveling to a communist country. When she left, I wanted to encourage her, because she was such a nice person. I told her that, after crossing the ocean, she should throw her passport in the toilet and pay the 5-dollar fine. That way she could get rid of the stamp attesting she had traveled to Romania.



    Trade unions in the communist period worked the same way as society at large across Romania. Even though they had a lot of leverage to face the powers that be, they were obedient, and regular folks saw them as tools of the regime, as opposed to their role of associations supposed to protect the common good.


    (Translated by C. Cotoiu)

  • October 31, 2015 UPDATE

    October 31, 2015 UPDATE

    NATIONAL MOURNING -
    The Prosecutor’s Office with the High Court of Cassation and Justice on
    Saturday carried out the first part of the investigation into Friday night’s
    fire, which broke out in a club in downtown Bucharest. The death toll stands at
    27 people dead and some 150 injured. The Romanian government has decreed three
    days of national mourning, to be observed on October 31st, November
    the 1st and 2nd, in -what is being considered- the second worst tragedy to strike Romania since 1989. The death toll could go up,
    because some of the injured are in a critical condition. Four foreign nationals
    are among them: two Spaniards, a German and an Italian. Between 300 and 500
    young people were attending a rock concert when the fire broke out. Romania’s
    President, Klaus Iohannis, has expressed grief but also revolt that such a
    tragedy could occur in downtown Bucharest, most likely against the backdrop of
    laws and norms in the field being ignored. The President of the European
    Commission, Jean Claude Juncker, has sent a message of condolences to the
    families and friends of the victims of the tragic accident that occurred on
    Friday night. In turn, the European Commissioner for Regional Policies, Corina
    Cretu, has expressed her deep sorrow and shock at the news of the tragedy in
    Bucharest. The Embassies of the United States of America and of the Russian
    Federation in Bucharest, respectively, have also sent messages of condolences.



    PLANE CRASH – All 224 people on board the Airbus321-200 passenger jet belonging to the Russian airline “Metrojet, which crashed on Saturday morning in Egypts Sinai Peninsula, lost their lives, the Egyptian government and the Russian Embassy in Cairo have confirmed. According to France Presse, the Egyptian wing of the Islamic State Jihadist group claimed responsibility for the crash on Tweeter, in retaliation for Rusias intervention in Syria. However, the Egyptian authorities say there is no clear evidence confirming an attack scenario. The Russian chartered plane was en route from the Egyptian resort of Sharm el Sheikh to the Russian city of Saint Petersburg. President Vladimir Putin decreed a day of national mourning on November 1.




    SUMMIT- Representatives of nine Central and East European countries, alongside NATO Deputy Secretary General, Alexander Vershbow, will attend a summit in Bucharest, on November the 4th. The NATO official has recently said a series of risks might appear when Russia gets involved in operations unfolding very close to NATO territory. Romanias President, Klaus Iohannis, the host of the summit, has said the participants will launch a common message on NATOs adjustment to the current security conditions.




    CHISINAU – The Democratic Party, the Liberal Party and the non-affiliated MPs in the Republic of Moldova, a former Soviet country, with a predominantly Romanian speaking population, on Friday had a first meeting for the formation of a new ruling coalition, Radio Chishinau has announced. The meeting was not attended by the Liberal Democratic Party, which has announced a decision will be made in the following days on whether or not it participates in the formation of a new alliance. The politicians have said a new pro-European majority is needed and invited the Liberal-Democrats to join the talks. We recall that the pro-European cabinet led by Liberal Democrat Valeriu Strelet was dissolved by Parliament on Thursday, following a censure motion initiated by the Socialists and the Communists, and backed by the Democratic Party, one of the members of the ruling coalition. Liberal Deputy Prime Minister Gheorghe Brega has been designated interim prime minister by Moldovan President Nicolae Timofti.



    TRADE UNIONS – Romanian trade unions affiliated to the SED LEX Federation will make a decision early next week on having a reaction at national level on the governments decision to increase the salaries of some of the state sector employees. SED LEX says the 50% increase in the basic salaries of people working in the financial system, as of November the 1st, is applied only to those working in central structures. Consequently, only 3,000 employees of the Finance Ministry and of the National Agency for Fiscal Administration, ANAF, will benefit from pay-rises, and not the 23,000 people working in the territorial structures of the public finance system. The Finance Ministry announced on Friday that approximately 5,700 employees of ANAF and the line ministry will benefit from an average 22% increase in their basic salaries. The ministry claims the measure is justified by the complex activities carried out in the aforementioned institutions and the urgent need to ensure the stability of the specialised staff.



    SINGAPORE – Czech tennis player Petra Kvitova has qualified for the finals of the WTA Tournament of Champions, in Singapore, with 7 million US dollars total prize money up for grabs. She managed to defeat Russian Maria Sharapova in a two set match played on Saturday. World number five Petra Kvitova will face, in the finals, Polish Agnieszka Radwanska, WTA no.6 ranked player, who defeated in the semi-finals second-seeded Spanish Garbine Muguruza.