Inius Trivia

Posts Tagged ‘romania’

This is the kind of story that those who live in a normal, not insane, country, will never see.

Some Romanian journalists and bloggers discovered last year (in 2009) that in 2008 one of the biggest “contributors” to the Romanian economy was a company from Brasov county that reported zero employees, zero spendings, zero investments and almost… $700.000.000 revenues! All generating a net profit worth of … $700.000.000!

The journalists tried to investigate this marvellous company and they discovered that the company’s “official” address is somewhere in a marginal village from Brasov county, in the house of some poor family that never heard about this company. In a word, in Romanian law this is called “illegal headquarter” and it was a sufficient reason for the authorities to investigate and eventualy close this company. But the authorities decided to take no action.

Recently, the Romanian Ministry of Treasury published all the financial data for 2009. In 2009 Romania had a deep economic fall, with (officialy) -7,2% economic growth y-to-y. This was a little surprise because everyone expected the fall to be somewhere between -9%-10%. So, the official data contradicted somehow the popular feelings.

With the crisis so deep, the Governement decided in February 2009 to take $20.000.000.000  (twenty billions) in loan from IMF (International Monetary Fund). But, of course, the IMF asked for some reforms and some economic parameters (such as budgetary deficit) to be reached. Very difficult task for a Government whose main task was to ensure the (fraudulent) re-election of Traian Basescu as President!

So, speaking again about that company, the journalists discovered that in 2009 the Ministry of Treasury considered the Brasov company as a … “big budget contributor” and that this ghost company reported now … $4.000.000.000 (four billions) as revenue, equal to profit! This equals 2,5% from Romanian GDP and it is bigger that the combined profit of Orange, Vodafone, Carrefour, Cora Hypermarche, Petrom OMV (the oil company), Erste-BCR Bank (biggest bank), Coca-Cola Romania and many other big Romanian businesses.

However, one mystery remained. Was it, or not, taken into account this “company” when calculating the GDP? Because, if this company’s turnover was taken into account for the GDP’s calculation, the implications were huge:

• In 2009, Romanian GDP fell not with -7,2%, but with almost 10% !
• The Romanian authorities have lied the IMF regarding the budgetary deficits that were well over the agreed limit !
• The state of Romanian economy is worst than reported!

This is why some journalists have immediately phone to the head of statistics and asked whether the officials took into account this company when they calculated the GDP for 2009.

And shock: initially, the answer was YES !

Then, only few hours later, when the answer was already published in several newspapers, a lot of State representatives (from Treasury, Statistics etc.) started to bombard the press with “explanatory” press-releases stating that this company was never included in GDP calculation. Even the head of statistics motivated that, when questioned about this problem, he was in… holiday and he answered yes, but in fact it was no!

Now the authorities have promise that they will conduct a very thorough investigation and, if needed, they will close this company. But this is crazy. It’s almost sure that the authorities used this ghost corporation to “improve” the statistics and to trick the IMF. And the Romanians. And themselves!

Conclusion: You should never underestimate the resources of Romanian bureacracy to produce lies. Since the inception of the national state, in the XIXth century, Romania was one of the most bureacratic countries in the world. In the XIXth century Romania had more state employees in office jobs (public clerks) than Germany or France. This situation continued during the XXth century. In Romania the sanitary or educational systems are lacking personnel, but town halls in villages with 2.500 of inhabitants have frequently 15-20 employees (and they are often relatives).

Under Traian Basescu’s presidency, Romania became the first dictatorship inside the EU. Here are the facts:

• Basescu controls all the secret services. Romania has now more “securitate” officers than under the Ceausescu’s regime, while hospitals cannot offer even an aspirin!
• Basescu was re-elected by massive fraud on 6 December 2009. Officialy, he lost the elections that took place inside the Romania’s borders by a narrow margin, but he was the “clear” winner of the elections that took place outside Romania. In embassies. Of course, all embassies were controled by his men!
• Romanian economy is governed by Basescu’s free will. In December 2004, in the very second day of his office, Basescu declared that Romanian fiscal system will drop the progressive tax and adopt a flat tax, despite the fact that preliminary studies showed that Romania cannot sustain such a tax. Starting with 2007, big spending deficits arised and now Romania is virtualy a bankrupted country. On May 6, 2010, during the negociations with IMF, Basescu announced that all the State salaries will be cut with 25% and all the pensions with 15% in order to cope with the spending deficits. Studies – and common sense! – showed that such mesures will make Romania’s depression even deeper.
• His will is beyond people’s will, Constitution and Parliament. When general elections took place in 2008, Social Democrat Party won the elections but he decided to nominate the prime minister from Democratic Party (his party). The Parliament voted against Emil Boc’s government on 12 September 2009, however Boc is still the Prime Minister today, on June 2010. In fact, Traian Basescu is de facto the Prime Minister of Romania. Whatever he says, Boc will execute.
• The Parliament under Basescu’s rule is nothing more than a cheap theatre. Yesterday they voted several times the same resolution until 2 AM. Finally the vote’s result was as needed by Basescu.
• Like any good dictator, he wants to shock. Caligula nominated his horse in the Senate. Basescu helped his daughter, who is notoriously stupid, to get a place in the European Parliament.

Romania is the second most poorest country in the EU. Our priorities should be the development of roads, a better public health system, a more focused educational system (in Romania, the school has nothing in common with the economy). Instead of these Romania, like Papa Doc’s Haiti, is spending a lot of money on “securitate” services. I really think that this guy will end like Ceausescu or, if not, he will be forced in a couple of years to fly to Paraguay or some other South American country.