I don’t like to adopt a nationalist stance on any day of the year and least of all when you are supposed to do so, such as on December 1, Romania’s national day. Rather than pen yet another pointless, devoid of meaning nationalist article, I’d much rather look at a few forgotten issues.

Victor Ponta, the presidential elections greatest loser, had run on a campaign having as slogan “the great union”. This, much like the National Day of Romania, is an attempt to galvanize the nationalist spirit and differentiate himself from Iohannis, who is seen as “German”. The irony is that Ponta himself is not “fully Romanian”, his grandfather or grand-grandfather having been an Italian from Trieste – watch his documentary if you don’t believe me. (I don’t remember about his mother, but nationality is irrelevant for me anyway.) What makes one Romanian is his own “declarative affiliation”, much like coming out gay or bisexual.

The story of December 1 having been chosen as the national day is also heavily politicized. Traditionally, for the most part of monarchic Romania’s existence, the national day was celebrated on May 10, which is closely connected to the instauration of the Hohenzollern monarchy. The communists changed it to August 23, when Romania turned against Nazi Germany in the second world war. After the regime change of December 1989, the democratic opposition wished for December 22 (when Ceausescu was toppled) to become the new national day but the crypto-communists in power (the precursor of the current PSD of Victor Ponta) adopted the compromise of December 1, which is the date when Transylvania joined Moldova (the Eastern province) and Muntenia (the Southern province). Still, Bessarabia (shown in the photo above as part of Moldova but currently a separate, independent republic) as well Bucovina joined at a later date, and then were lost to the Russian bully.

LE: There's also a large chunk of territory known as the "Quadrilater" or "Cadrilaterul" right next to the Black Sea Coast, South of the Danube, that belonged to Romania for a while and is now a part of Bulgaria. It is of little importance, except that it has the "Queen Maria's castle". This piece of land is highly unlikely to ever return to Romania, yet nationalist Romanians keep printing it in "Whole Romania" maps.

Iohannis’ election is seen by those less familiar with the Romanian reality as a sign that Romania is “ethnicity-blind” but that’s unfortunately not so. While Romanians are philoGerman, they pretty much detest all the other minorities, and most of all the Hungarian minority. Everything, from choosing the National Day to Ponta’s “great union” theme, are direct punches to this minority. Romanians would never vote for a [wooden like Iohannis] Hungarian president (NEVER, in a million years!), a Gypsy / Roma president (though never say never – president Iliescu may have been an educated Roma) or a Jewish president (again, a nice, sophisticated, personable Jew might get elected). The reason is that the Hungarian minority constantly agitates for more autonomy, which most Romanians see as a precursor to territorial separation of their enclaves in Transylvania. Now, when I predicted Ponta would win I did so hoping I’m wrong (and thankfully I was), but here I am most likely right.

USA seems to also have cooled off in its traditional “happy birthday Romania” sent to the Romanian President. The last such message came from Obama, but this time, it’s from Kerry the Turtle.

Even some Romanian intellectuals have decided to question Iohannis choices for people to surround himself with and have done so in an open letter. He replied on his Facebook page, seeking to reassure them without promising or committing to anything new (hn-r22). I am not trying to play down these people’s concerns, but I just don’t share them. You can find most of my concerns in what’s wrong with Iohannis.

Yet it is not entirely honest to question the Romanian nationalist movement regarding Transylvania while completely ignoring the Hungarian nationalist movement in the same country. See consistency for more.

Sources / More info: wiki-1dec, usa-1dec, js-jk, hn-r22