If you think that Bolojan, Grindeanu, Hunor, Dan or Buzoianu are always bad and the “business environment” is always good, you will get angry

“The business environment urgently demands a government,” blared a recent news story on HotNews. The information was taken from a recent press release of the Concordia confederation, led by the well-known and influential entrepreneur Dan Șucu. If it were a state, Concordia would have 6 times the GDP of the Republic of Moldova.

The laureate of the Nobel Prize for Economics in 2024, Daron Acemoğlu, says that it is time “to also recognize what Romania has managed to achieve”.

I started from a difficult position 30 years ago. We managed to advance, although “many feared that most transition economies would not be able to recover the gaps”, as the Nobel economist admits, without hiding his admiration for Romania.

When it comes to institutions…

Daron Acemoğlu's interview will be published soon in HotNews. The economist says that when societies cultivate inclusive political institutions (that is, those that are not in the hands of a mob), successful economic institutions will also emerge. First political and civic institutions and then economic ones. This is the order, and not the other way around, Acemoğlu believes.

In terms of institutions, politics and the social sphere take precedence over the economy. Because economic development under flawed political institutions cannot be stable and long-lasting and cannot lead people and states to prosperity and freedom.

“Concordia State” demands “urgent government”

I don't know how many people were startled and how many people applauded when they saw the recent press release of the Romanian business world. The employers' association indirectly but transparently criticizes the political world. Rather, I think it was a commendable gesture. Because people hate politicians.

If it were a state, the Concordia Employers' Confederation would have in its 40 counties-federations more than 4,000 localities-companies with a turnover of about 120 billion euros. This means 30% of Romania's GDP.

With 500,000 employee-citizens, the “state of Concordia” has a GDP 30% higher than that of Serbia and 6 times higher than the GDP of the Republic of Moldova.

This is the force that “urgently calls for a government, after the EC revised the most severe economic growth forecast for Romania”. So you will be annoyed if you continue reading this article.

Because you can quickly ask for a government, but it's worth seeing how things are.

You ask for a government quickly, but you will have it as you quickly had a title with Rapid

As president of “Concordia”, Dan Șucu knows best that you can ask for simpler things than a functional government, but you risk not getting them.

Şucu has requested every year since he has been the patron of the Rapid football team to win the championship. He didn't take it.

On May 24, Șucu celebrates four years since he has been a shareholder in Rapid. When he arrived in football, Dan Șucu made a move that helped professionalize an entire field. He invested seriously.

The businessman said that he is sure that the size of the budget cannot be equated with success. The more money you put in, the more successful you will be. An almost mathematical determination.

The patron provided a title budget. Until now, Rapid has ranked, year after year, between 5th and 6th place. It has changed a lot of coaches. And although “there is no more beautiful and beloved team than Rapid”, although it is good that the investment is rewarded by performance, although it would be good to have a government quickly, this does not mean that it is always possible.

Social institutions, from Parliament to functional justice and from football clubs to confidence in elections, are all created with a greater dose of unpredictability than a brand or a private company.

To run companies, to run a state

Sucu knew that success comes hard. He's not naive. Not one of the “Concordia Confederacy” is. They are serious, fighting, consistent people.

This is how the leadership of the “Confederation of Concordia” looks like:

• Dan Șucu – Mobexpert – President (elected by the Employers' Federation of Commerce Networks).
• Radu Căprău – OMV Petrom – Vice President (representing the oil and gas sector).
• Mihai Matei – Essensys Software – Vice President (representing the IT / software sector).
• Sergiu Manea – BCR – Vice President (representing the financial-banking sector).
• Ondrej Safar – CEZ Romania – Vice President (representing the energy supplier sector).
• Steven van Groningen – former Raiffeisen Bank Romania – Honorary President

We are talking about entrepreneurs or managers who know the price of effort. They are leaders who have repeatedly, and under generally difficult conditions, made the test of successful organization. Naturally, you believe Mihai Matei or Radu Căprău when they oppose Sorin Grindeanu, Nicușor Dan, Kelemen Hunor, Ilie Bolojan or George Simion.

But that doesn't mean there isn't a major difference between business and public service.

Running a business is hellish. Running a state can be almost impossible – especially now, when serious experts are asking whether society has entered the ungovernable zodiac, all over the world, not just here.

What shocked Musk and how he understood

There are famous and recent examples. In public administration, you depend on people in a different way than you do when running a business.

When Elon Musk and his band of genius programmers arrived in the US government, the brilliant innovator found himself unable to make decisions like he could in his own company.

Musk was shocked. And it made a difference. Here's a simple layout:

• You can keep the young people you pay at Tesla up to midnight with $500,000 a year.
• But you can't keep civil servants paid $90,000 a year overtime day in and day out.

We are frustrated by Nicușor Dan's slowness in forming a new government. The truth is that his team from Cotroceni is paid a third compared to the management teams they have at their disposal in the banks and in energy Sergiu Manea and Ondrej Safar.

Of course, there are institutions like ANRE or ASF, where the average salary has exceeded that of private companies. But these are exceptions in the public system.

Tudor Manea, head of eMAG, has at his disposal some of Romania's brightest minds, as do the brothers Pavăl and Karina Pavăl at Dedeman. But I don't know how he would react if he was quickly asked in two weeks for a “governance program” after the Carrefour acquisition.

The terrible fail of a great corporation

The tone of the public letter in which the “Confederation of Concordia” calls for a speedy government is civilized, to be honest. There are arguments, figures.

The initiative, however, conveys an almost ultimate dose of exasperation.

Whenever this discussion comes up, I am reminded of the testimony of the UK Defense Secretary.

Philip Hammond had become defense secretary from a private background. England was to host the London Olympics in 2012. One day, all of us accredited journalists were told that we now urgently needed to go to the stadiums faster. “There is a big problem with the company that organizes the security of the Games.”

The giant G4S corporation had failed. The Olympics were in the air. Athletes and spectators were going to enter the arenas in a few days and they had no choice.

Although one of the world's top employers, G4S terminated the contract when it realized it could not cope with the complexity of the task. Terrorist threats had filled social media. The problems were too big. The costs were too high.

The government resorted to a desperate measure: it called in the army. The sports world has gone wild. How will the military handle the filters? What will happen?

Testimony of a minister

Everything went smoothly. I have been, as a journalist, to six editions of the Olympic Games and I have never encountered such politeness, firmness and competence as in the service provided by the British soldiers in London.

In a public appearance that I cannot forget, the defense minister said what he felt. “We came to the Ministry of Defense with the preconceived notion that we have to look at how the private sector works in order to know how we should proceed in government,” he admitted. “But we got a lesson: how we could work in private, looking at those in the public system.”

The minister gave an anthological example. He had received information that a supposedly hostile military plane had entered British airspace. He asked what to do. “I was told that we have four options ready.”

“Four options?” he replied, the manager from the corporate world who was haunted by the waste that was just taking shape. “Yes, Minister. Our first plane is on an intercept mission right now.” “And the second one?” said the minister. “The second one is in the air, if something bad happens to the first plane.”

Okay, but the third one? The third one is at the base, with the pilot in the cockpit, if something happens to the first ones. And the fourth? The fourth is ready with the pilot next to him, if anything happens to the first three.

Everything cannot be outsourced

“They taught me an important lesson,” the businessman-turned-politician repeated in amazement. He was witness to the way seemingly impossible stakes are resolved.

The minister was honest to the end: “We, in the private sector, would probably have thought that the second plane should be outsourced, for reasons of cost. Let it be leased somewhere, to a company in Dubai, which was probably closed at the time when we needed the plane.”

Yes, the private sector in Romania urgently demands a government.

The problem is on Nicușor Dan's desk. Because that's the office that issues unresolved in any other office, private or public, in Romania. This cannot be outsourced.