Today, all of the local news stations are buzzing over the latest catastrophe from Romania’s foreign minister, Teodor Melescanu, in which he was caught red-handed in a BBC interview defending corruption: Ouch! Of course, it must be remembered that Melescanu is quite literally an old Communist dinosaur (link in Romanian) with a troubling history of supporting dictatorships. Bedfellows Melescanu was quite busy in 2018. Here’s … Continue reading Melescanu Shits the Bed
In response to your letter on December 19, 2018, asking the Central Bank of Romania’s opinion on the emergency ordinance to raise taxes, we hereby send you a series of analyses that we have conducted. We would also like to mention that since we only had a limited amount of time to prepare this report, our conclusions must be considered merely preliminary in nature. Continue reading Poking the Giant
It is truly astonishing that Romania, perpetually struggling with budgetary shortfalls, still has such an expensive line item in place just to subsidize successful political parties. Continue reading Milking That Cow
Advisory warning: What follows is an extremely tedious and detailed analysis of the recent mayoral elections in Chisinau, the conclusion of which is that I stand by my initial findings. This past week, the European Union decided to freeze a 100 million euro aid package to Moldova specifically because of the Chisinau mayoral race: Disbursements under the Macro-Financial Assistance program hinge on the successful implementation … Continue reading The Chisinau Mayoral Election, Part 2
On May 20, 2018, voters in Chisinau headed to the polls for the first round of what was a very low-key and boring election. Since 2007, Chisinau has been run like a personal fiefdom by Dorin Chirtoaca, a close personal friend of former Romanian President Traian Basescu. Chirtoaca was re-elected in 2015 and should still be in office today except that he was arrested in … Continue reading The Curious Case of the Chisinau Mayoral Race
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