The purpose of the literary-musical and sociopolitical club “Alexei Mateevici” was to culturalize and enlighten the population, at a time when the people were misled by Soviet propaganda, the founder of the club run during the national renaissance period Anatol Șalaru stated in a public debate hosted by IPN News Agency. According to him, the club aimed to explain to the people that Romanian was the language of the population of historical Bessarabia and Tsarist Russia occupied this territory.

The founder of “Alexei Mateevici” club noted that any nation builds on elites and a part of the elite of historical Bessarabia, although it was formed in Kiev and St. Petersburg, later generated the national liberation movement.

”A nation builds on elites. The Romanian people in Bessarabia had elites, but starting with the 1830s these elites were trained in Kiev and St. Petersburg. A serious movement developed from among these elites and led to the national awakening of the Romanians in Bessarabia during World War One. These elites, who were later elected to the People’s Council, voted for the Union of Bessarabia with Romania. These elites represented us in the Parliament and the Government in Bucharest. They met the demands. We must admit that during Tsarist Russia, the school in Kiev and St. Petersburg was at a very high level. But there were also elites who became Russified and who were promoters of Russian ideas in Bessarabia. Subsequently, those elites, which we believed no longer existed, started the National Liberation Movement in the 1980s. We are talking about the Writers’ Union, the Creative Unions, the teachers, the doctors,” explained the founder of “Alexei Mateevici” club during the national renaissance period.

According to Anatol Șalaru, although the Romanians in Bukovina were occupied by the Austro-Hungarian Empire, they were privileged in relation to the Romanians in Bessarabia, occupied by the Tsarist Empire. The Austro-Hungarian Empire proved to be much more civilized than the Tsarist Empire, as it did not insist on the denationalization of the native population.

“Bucovina was lucky to have a more civilized occupier. The Austro-Hungarian Empire that occupied Bukovina for a long time differed in at least two aspects from the Tsarist Empire. It did not try to change the church. They were not Orthodox and they did not interfere with the church. They did not ban the church and they did not ban the Romanian language in churches. Moreover, this empire did not try to ban the Romanian language. It did not get involved in what was related to history, culture, language. It did not try to denationalize the Romanians in Bukovina. Russia did this through the church, which after 1830 was an instrument in the hands of the Tsarist Empire,” said Anatol Șalaru.

He explained that the desire to reveal the historical truth led to the creation of “Alexei Mateevici” literary club. Subsequently, this club was the spark that lit the flame of national rebirth.

“I analyzed the situation in the Soviet Union well because the repressive apparatus of the USSR in January 1988 was very strong. The idea appeared after I read Ioan Slavici’s book Memories from Putna. In January 1988, we proposed to create the literary-musical and sociopolitical club. Initially, the goal was to ensure cultural enlightenment. We had to explain to the people, who were misled and were victims of Soviet propaganda, that we speak Romanian, we are Romanians, we were occupied. On the stage of “Mateevici” club on the Alley of Classics, the ultimatum sent by the USSR to Romania in 1940 and the Ribbentrop-Molotov pact were read for the first time. When a people knows its language and history, political slogans appear by themselves. A person who knows nothing cannot generate political slogans. That’s why we started with culturalization, with the idea of enlightenment. We held hundreds of meetings in villages. We recorded public speeches about language, alphabet, history. We distributed thousands of audio cassettes in localities and the people started to realize reality,” stated Anatol Șalaru.

The public debate entitled “Golgotha of the Romanian Language” was the 314th installment of the series “Developing Political Culture through Public Debates”. The project is implemented by IPN News Agency with the assistance of the Hanns Seidel Foundation of Germany.