Or it may be much more: the picture of the Romanian administration's real abilities, defeated by the floods and also by its own passivity, in the dirt inherited from the Phanar. This is it ad no one or nothing can change or influence it. The EU and NATO accession has imposed no constraints, it has changed its essence in no way, it has not influenced the decision-making system. So the more and more violent clime phenomena have been taken authorities unprepared for some years now. They seem more and more unprepared, in more need of means and equipment. Romania has got to resemble a third world state more and more and in everything. It is a country stricken by catastrophe, but serenely waiting for God's will to calm nature down so that people can come down from forests and hills, where they have been hiding due to their historical reflex dating back to the time of heathen invasions, and start mending their households. As we have seen, all politicians from all groups have lied again and rather grossly. This is what they are in the habit of doing: when some snowfall, heat, storm or flooding takes them by surprise, they hurry to the damages areas together with TV teams and they do the only thing they can do: vain promises. Numberless times have they promised the national committee for emergency and its local branches situations will be granted all the funds needed by means of a coherent national program meat to settle civil emergencies. Romania announced this patriotically both to in the EU and the NATO, once again counting on the naivete of the two institutions' stuff. They aren't interested in the true state of things. Therefore the means the local committees for emergencies have got are unknown to everybody because they are ridiculously insignificant. No one would talk about the food, drinkable water, medicine and technical equipment reserves. Never do they talk about the existence of a national fund for emergency situations to include high quality equipment ready to be used in major disaster cases. As seen, there isn't even a minimal protocol to define the way prefects decide to announce a state of emergency. Of course there is no talk about such things, for such things don't exist. This is it. So given the amplitude of this disaster, why has there been no emergency meeting of the Supreme Council for National Defense to declare a state of emergency in the damaged areas, which would have allowed for military action? Why haven't the prefects asked for it so that people and belongings would be rescued and transport together with communication could be restored? Why haven't they made the slightest use of special carriers, high capacity trucks, personal transport helicopters and more equipment? This is total mystery. Has there been no time for it? Have state officials been busy with family matters, so they could not ruin one longer weekend? Has it been hard form them to interrupt their holidays? Maybe it has, maybe it hasn't. They just don't care. But elections are looming ahead and they will be promising to do things? What things? All things: houses, households, ditches with special gates to avoid overloading, like they could see en route to Amsterdam, trees planted on hillsides. I mean those hillsides which they themselves or their mafia protegees deforested like crazy... And they will be elected again so that they can wait for the future catastrophes to come and give them the cold shoulder.

Cristian UNTEANU