Cristian Tudor Popescu, about Nicușor Dan's journey with the Spartan military plane: “He communicated the illegality to us between two forced laughs, with his mouth up to his ears”
Cristian Tudor Popescu, at the launch of his volume “Vremea Mînzului Sec”, during the Bookfest, in Bucharest, on June 1, 2019. PHOTO: Inquam Photos / Bogdan Buda
Journalist and writer Cristian Tudor Popescu commented Thursday on President Nicușor Dan's trip to France with the Spartan military aircraft, which got stuck in Paris and caused the head of state to return to the country late.
Cristian Tudor Popescu draws attention to a possible “crime” of Nicușor Dan and makes an ironic comparison of him with former president Ion Iliescu.
“The head of the Romanian state and supreme commander of the Army pronounced in the Spartan plane the words “I was disconnected from Romania for 4 and a half hours”. All the subsequent sayings, that “the president was misinformed”, that “the Spartan has a communication system” only accuse Mr. Dan of launching a fake news, that he still wants to create a department to combat fake news at the presidency. So that we don't believe something like that, all we have to do is take what he said. Which, by the way, shouldn't have been said, even if it's true, because that's exactly how the president created a security risk”, wrote the journalist, in a post on his Facebook page entitled “President Aghiasma”.
“In fact, it is a serious illegality. If Mr. Dan had been in surgery for 270 minutes, let's say, in a surgery with general anesthesia, he should have had a deputy appointed for this period of time. A “disconnected” president means a crime that should be criminally investigated as a matter of urgency,” CTP said.
“I can't help but notice that Mr. Dan communicated the illegality to us between two forced laughs, with his mouth up to his ears, as I see him doing lately. I don't understand him. Does he want to compete with Ion Iliescu? Does he want to convey a state of optimism and cheerfulness to us? I, for one, the president's cheerfulness scares me…”, the journalist added.
And the conclusion of Cristian Tudor Popescu is the following: “Our president is particularly “balanced”, that is, holy water, he does neither harm nor good. President Aghiasmă”.
President Nicușor Dan traveled to Paris for Tuesday's meeting of the “Coalition of the Will” supporting Ukraine in a Spartan military aircraft, which resulted in his being stranded at the airport for more than 24 hours due to bad weather conditions. In addition to these problems, Nicușor Dan drew attention after he said that when he is in the Spartan, “he is disconnected from the reality in Romania”, due to the technological deficiencies in the aircraft.
The military plane does not have WiFi or a system that would allow the president to chat on a secure channel, as Nicușor Dan said. “On this plane (Spartan, no) we have no communications. For four and a half hours, I was disconnected from the reality in Romania and this is not normal”, said the president of the journalists who accompanied him to Paris.
Asked about the need for a presidential plane by the journalists who traveled with him, Nicușor Dan said that “at some point we have to have one. And not only for the president, but also for the ministers who go on delegations when there are important things.”
He emphasized, however, that Romania cannot afford a presidential plane. “Now is not the time,” reasoned the head of state.
Until now, President Nicușor Dan has traveled with the Spartan in all foreign trips, whether he went to Chisinau or Helsinki.
“This is the explanation for the 30 million reduction we were talking about,” the head of state told journalists on the plane on January 6. He referred to the spending cuts announced by the Presidential Administration.
