Moldovan independence started with the declaration of the Romanian language as the country's official language and the return to Latin alphabet. The opinion was voiced by writer Nicolae Dabija at the “Place for Dialogue” talk-show on Radio Moldova, IPN reports.
“I remember the Great National Assembly, when nearly a million people knelt because they wanted to speak their language”, said Dabija. According to the writer, national languages ruined the Soviet Union. “In all of the Union's republics, except for Georgia, the official language was Russian, stipulated in their constitutions. People were persecuted if they spoke their native language. At the Writers' Union, there were only three Russian-speaking writers and we, all the others, had to conform and speak Russian or otherwise we violated the constitution”, recalls Dabija.
He highlighted the role of writers in the national liberation movement and in preserving national values. “There were proletcult writers like Emilian Bucov, Andrei Lupan, Bogdan Istru, but even they have their merit and contributed to preserving and promoting Romanian language”, said Dabija.
He regrets that even today the ethnic minorities in Moldova speak “the language of a foreign state”, and not that of the country they are living in. On the other had, Dabija is glad that Romanian language is taught in schools and the youth have come to “speak Romanian like in Bucharest”. He added that no Romanian-speaking youth would choose the Customs Union instead of the European Union.
Nicolae Dabija is a renowned activist of the national liberation and renaissance movement, member of the Supreme Soviet of USSR and of Moldova's first Parliament, where he signed the Declaration of Independence. As chief editor of “Literatura si Arta” weekly paper, published by the Writers' Union of Moldova, he played a major role in the fight for national renaissance in Moldova. The paper was in 1988-1989 the main publication that endorsed the return to Latin alphabet and Romanian language and its declaration as official language of the Moldovan SSR. During its glory days, it had a circulation of 260,000 copies. In 2005, Dabija was elected head of the Democratic Forum of Romanians in Moldova, a law and culture NGO, which was joined by 150 cultural organizations, artistic unions and nongovernmental associations.
