“Emil Constantinescu asked if he believed in God, I would have asked him something”

With a well-dosed irony and forming a portrait unfinished by the most controversial president of Romania after the fall of the communist regime, the political science professor Cristian Preda, 58, makes a complex indictment to Ion Iliescu, the state leader who called the miners in the street to stifle the population.

Professor Cristian Preda, at the death of Ion Iliescu: “It was declared a man on the left, but he used the strength against the citizens who challenged him”

– Professor Preda, what should the tiktok generation know about Ion Iliescu?
– that he was the first president elected directly by the Romanian citizens, that he was first voted with 86% of the votes of those who came to the ballot box, that he was then elected twice, although the Constitution limits to two the number of mandates of a head of state, that he declared a man on the left, but he used the strength against the citizens who challenged him, as an authoritarian system, that He called the miners to calm the students who did not want one president who had made a career for 35 years in the communist regime, that he was chased King Mihai in the country.when he wanted to return after four decades from the moment he had been forced to abdicate, but that he later accepted as a head of state, and that he tried to impose in the political vocabulary the word “consens”, but that he had too much success, and, finally, that he was investigated by the prosecutors to find out why he died in December 1989. I think it would be some matter for a few videos on Tiktok.

Cristian Preda in the Freedom Studio

– How would you catalog the reactions that occurred in society with the triggering of state funerals? I have noticed many contradictory positions, discussions related to the national mourning day, how the former president is buried, the boycott of the USR.
– Iliescu divided into two society in the 15 years as the most important figure on the proof of politics. Indeed, between 1989 and 2004, and how much was in power, and how much was in opposition during that period, he knew how to divide, to master. It was natural for death to do the same. As he never assumed the wounds left by Mining and the overthrow of Ceausescu, he was perceived by much of society as a communist who failed to convert to the values of freedom. There were a few moments when he behaved like a democrat. For example, when he accepted his defeat in 1996. The division could not cease at Iliescu's death, because traumas are greater than the sympathies. The USR adopted the attitude of those who wrote, in the spring of 1990, the proclamation from Timisoara, who demanded that the former communist responsible people do not participate in the political life for 10 years, while Iliescu's camp wants to delete from the memory of the evil society with which Iliescu was associated, as he wanted to delete the Romanians.

“I would ask Ion Iliescu why he did not have the courage of Doina Cornea”

– How do you think Ion Iliescu will be remembered over 5, 10 years, in the collective memory of this people?
– In 1987 a bench circulated that sounds like this: a listener asks on Radio Erevan how the Romanians will remember Ceausescu over 50 years. Radio Erevan replies: Nicolae Ceausescu will be said to have been a politician from Helmut Duckadam's time. I would respond in the same style: over half a century, about Iliescu will be said to have called the miners to beat the students two hours after Romania was defeated by Cameroon 2-1, at the World Football Championship in Italy.

– including in the sport area, certain discussions have appeared, more precisely against the background of the FRF decision to take a moment of silence at the matches of the Romanian Cup on Wednesday, on the list being a Jiul Petrosani – Minerul Lupeni. Was the decision of the federation inspired or not?
– Apparently, FRF wanted to remember that Iliescu and the miners loved each other very much. When it comes to football, I confess that I have a weakness, because, as far as I have heard, Iliescu kept with Rapid, who is the team that I idolatize. I have never seen him at the match.

– If you had only one question that Ion Iliescu would have to answer, what question would you ask them?
– Emil Constantinescu asked in the 1996 campaign if he believes in God. I would have asked him why he had no courage they had not Havel or Walesa, but Doina Cornea. Which I consider the most important voice of the opposition to communism in the 1980s. French teacher in Cluj, she courageously endured the intimidation of the Security and the Unique Party, who wanted to make her shut up, after writing to Ceausescu that if she is not able to make reforms, then she must leave the country. Neither Iliescu, nor Brucan, nor other communists who after 1989 posed in the heroes did not support Doina Cornea before Ceausescu's fall even with a phone. Then, when they saw that they were opposed to them, they did their best to take it “crazy”. Exactly what the security about her had said …

The anti -communist dissident Doina Cornea ceased life on May 4, 2018. It opposed Ceausescu's regime, but also the one installed after the Revolution by Ion Iliescu / Photo: Imago Images