A group of activists and Nistru war veterans announced plans to form the Romanian Citizens Platform on March 24, “an apolitical civic platform designed to establish a closer link between Romanian civil society from the Republic of Moldova and the Romanian authorities”.
The inaugural meeting of the Congress will take place at the Moldovan Academy of Fine Arts, which hosted the historic 1918 vote for Bessarabia’s unification with Romania.
Pro-unification activist Constantin Lazar, a member of the initiative group, told a press conference that the platform will be open to anyone regardless of ethnic belonging, and it will work to the benefit of all Romanian citizens in Moldova without any discrimination on ethnic grounds.
Constantin Lazar says that Romanian citizens in Moldova are currently facing many problems that need to be solved, such as the taxes they have to pay at the border to be able to drive in their country, Romania. The border infrastructure is underdeveloped and pedestrians are not allowed passage. Another issue mentioned by Lazar is the complicated procedure of regaining Romanian citizenship and the big costs involved.
Anatol Petrici, another member of the initiative group, said that the Romanian citizens of the Republic of Moldova are under-represented in the governing structures of the Romanian state. The Romanian Citizens' Congress aims to increase the civic activism of Romanians in Moldova, to mobilize them to defend their rights and to solve the problems they are facing.
Mayor Gheorghe Raileanu of Cimislia noted that the Romanian citizens of Moldova are divided and were unable to mobilize themselves into a single force in order to participate in the past elections. “The unionist electorate was pushed aside by politicians who have divided society with their geopolitical rhetoric and fight against corruption,” declared the mayor. According to Gheorghe Raileanu, Moldova has major problems caused by the massive migration that leads to the depopulation of the country, and the most effective solution to avoid a humanitarian crisis in Moldova is the unification with Romania.
Iulian Ucrainet, a Ukrainian ethnic, said that the Romanian Citizens’ Congress will be a structure not only for Romanians but for all ethnic minorities in Moldova. Romania has shown that it does not have a chauvinistic attitude towards other minorities, and closer cooperation with Romania, besides the economic benefit, will have a positive cultural impact for all minorities in the country.
Ion Rata, the president of the “Nistru War Volunteers and Disabled People” NGO, said the platform will fight for the improvement of citizens' lives. According to him, politicians in all these years have deliberately divided society on ethnic criteria in order to achieve their own interests.