NEWS ANALYSIS : Romania Strives for Stability in Break With Past as Economy Takes a Free Fall

What is dividing and conquering Romania nearly a year after its anti-Communist revolt is that “some people are satisfied with half a loaf of bread.”

Engineer Raluca Nan’s condemnation of those who feel they have blessings to count is a view shared by many educated professionals seeking to oust the Romanian leadership elected only six months ago.

Her assessment is accurate but unsettling, since it highlights a broadening chasm separating Romania’s 23 million citizens.

There are those willing to tough out continued privation, hesitantly putting faith in government assurances of eventual relief from the suffering institutionalized under late dictator Nicolae Ceausescu.

And there are those, like Nan, who accuse fearful countrymen of being taken in by ex-Communists who hijacked the revolution in order to thwart its intended reforms.

What bodes ill for Romania’s stability is the opposition’s ready concession that it is a minority unwilling to submit to majority rule.

“I don’t think the majority supports a second revolution, because the majority is not thinking,” said Nan, one of 12,000 who marched through this Transylvanian industrial city recently to protest price increases and demand that the government resign.

Demonstrations that have drawn as many as 200,000 Romanians to the streets have called for the ouster of President Ion Iliescu, who won 87% of the May vote that foreign observers said was flawed but generally reflective of the people’s will.

Unrelenting opposition has nudged Romania dangerously close to the kind of turmoil paralyzing Bulgaria, where another intellectual minority angered by the peasantry’s electoral choice has rendered the new government powerless to arrest an economic free fall.

Getting tough with dissenters is not an option for Prime Minister Petre Roman, who has been struggling to show democratic tolerance and win back Western trust since Iliescu’s disastrous June decision to quell unrest with a vigilante rampage.

Roman and his technocrat allies are intent on radical transition of the stagnant economy and have vowed not to be deterred by opposition efforts at “government from the streets.”

Yet some ministers seem to have distanced themselves from the president and his populist National Salvation Front, perhaps hoping to save their reform program--and their positions--in the event Iliescu is forced to resign.

Introduction of sink-or-swim capitalism on Nov. 1 has turned up the volume of the anti-government protests, but Roman insists the transition to a market economy is irreversible.

In a recent interview with the Los Angeles Times, the 44-year-old prime minister said radical reforms are needed to stir Romanian workers from a post-revolutionary slumber that has decimated the economy.

“We explained very clearly to everyone several times that price liberalization is the first tool to affect a new economic dynamic,” said Roman, whose ministerial headquarters is still abuzz with activity at 7 p.m. “It’s very simple. No work, no pay. Now, people have to work at a certain level to live in normal conditions.”

Romanians underwent a much-needed “decompression” after Ceausescu’s overthrow and execution, but Roman said the relaxation has gone too far. Industrial output is down 30% from last year, threatening Romania’s very survival.

“We have calculated that the best way to reduce the adverse effects of unemployment and inflation is to step very quickly over this transition period,” Roman said. “We believe the old saying ‘Long illness, sure death.’ I want to avoid the funeral of the Romanian economy.”

Unlike most other countries in Eastern Europe, Romania carries very little foreign debt, which gives it some leeway with credit to revamp outdated production equipment.

But Roman said his country will not make the mistake of borrowing to finance consumption, even though imports could ease mounting popular resistance to his reforms.

“For the basic, immediate needs, we are not worried,” said the English-speaking prime minister. “Food products exist, as our agricultural performance this year was acceptable. We can ensure sufficient supply for at least the next three months, and we are not touching the price of basic foods, heat or electricity or, for the moment, the question of rents.”

Expecting producers to set prices for their goods according to what the market will bear has effectively frozen internal trade, as inexperienced buyers and sellers learn the art of negotiation and compromise.

Store shelves are virtually empty, but Bucharest officials promise that relief is on the horizon. Cars and appliances costing twice what they used to are now available, and perishable foods not exempt from the price increases are appearing at random in produce stands.

Most enterprises remain under state ownership but have been put on notice that they must pay their own way or declare bankruptcy in a state incapable of being generous with its jobless. A law requiring wages to be negotiated between management and labor is expected within a few weeks, and modest funds for unemployment are already being set aside.

The government has advised failing factories that return to a six-day workweek, as was standard practice under Ceausescu, may be their only hope of recovery and survival.

Because of the worldwide oil crisis and the trade embargo against Iraq, which repaid debts to Romania with fuel shipments, Romania’s energy outlook this winter is grim. The government has promised to maintain home heating at 68 degrees Fahrenheit, but harsh temperatures could force rationing of electricity or closure of inefficient factories on the coldest days.

The economic difficulties add up to living conditions only marginally better than before the revolution.

At grocery stores in the heart of Brasov, one of Romania’s biggest cities, the stock in mid-November was limited to macaroni, six types of canned fruits and vegetables, pretzels, Vietnamese shrimp crackers and powdered detergent. Shoppers queued for hours at separate stores selling meat and bread, which cannot be distributed efficiently because of a lack of portioning and packaging equipment.

“There is no cause for hope in young families,” complained Ovidiu Popa, a 27-year-old building engineer at a Brasov protest against the ruling front last week. “There’s no money for our work, and now it costs a year’s salary to buy a kitchen stove.”

“No leadership can submit to government from the streets,” claimed Roman’s chief of staff, Baltazar Bogdan. “But we are powerless to stop the protests.”

Western governments have refused to lift economic sanctions against Romania stemming from the June crackdown on anti-government demonstrators, which has served to deter further excesses of power as well as foreign investment.

“There is a retroactive guilt complex in the West,” Bogdan said, alluding to U.S. extension of special trade status to Romania during the years of dictatorship. “They feel they were taken by Ceausescu once, and they will look very carefully at ‘these bloody Romanians’ this time around.”

But without Western support, “we won’t make it,” Bogdan said. “Romania is coming out of a long, long illness.”