Dagestan of Europe. „It’s their problem”

The explosion at the LPG storage facility in Crevedia, which resulted in two deaths and dozens injured, remains a classic case of political corruption. With it, Romania is morphing into a sort of „Dagestan of Europe” – meaning a backward country, plagued by corruption, with malfunctioning institutions, constantly projecting the image of a failed state.

Two weeks ago, 35 people died and over 80 were injured following an explosion at a gas station in the former Soviet republic, Dagestan.

„The causes of the disaster are still unknown, but accidents and fires of this type are commonplace in Russia. Often, they are caused by breaches of safety standards or the age of the installations,” noted the Agence France-Presse in its report dated August 15th.

In Crevedia too, safety norms were blatantly disregarded. The fire department withdrew the operational license of the fuel depot in 2020 because it did not maintain safe distances from nearby electrical installations and used an unapproved pump that had fuel leakages.

The firefighters did their duty; they fined the company twice and notified seven institutions. Instead of taking action, the institutions archived the notification from the Emergency Situations Inspectorate. The company continued to operate in the „Dagestan of Europe” for three years, unhindered by any other state institution.

Three years later, the depot exploded, likely due to a lit cigarette. Political corruption set a time bomb in Crevedia.

How was this possible? The company Flagas SRL, which operated the fuel depot in Crevedia, officially belongs to the son of an influential and wealthy PSD mayor from Olt county. The mayor of Caracal, Ion Doldurea, suspended himself from the party, even though he claims he has never had any involvement in his son’s company.

G4Media.ro revealed that Ion Doldurea was appointed by the PSD baron Paul Stănescu in 2019 to lead the PSD Caracal, replacing Dan Ciocan, who wanted to take control of the PSD organization in Olt from Stănescu.

With such political backing, the son’s company could afford to formally shut down its operation in Crevedia in 2020 after the ISU’s approval was withdrawn. However, business operations continued uninterrupted, the depot continued to operate because no one could interfere: the mayor of Crevedia is also from the PSD.

Thus, the company thrives and reports profits of tens of millions of lei in a year.

After the PSD entered the government at the end of 2021, any risk for the mayor’s son’s company being audited, closed, or fined disappears. It’s worth noting that this defiant behavior is set against the backdrop of the collapse of anti-corruption institutions.

The anti-corruption fight has succumbed due to a lack of political will, manifested at the top of the state, led by President Klaus Iohannis. After another fire at the hospital in Constanța in 2021, where nine people died, the head of state declared that „the Romanian state has failed in its fundamental mission to protect its citizens.”

Today, no one values the Romanian state. Romania seems like a country completely out of the state’s control, operating purely out of inertia.

The company’s mode of operation not only indicates that it benefited from political protection but also reveals a complete disappearance from society and the political class of any fear of prosecutors, the DNA, and oversight institutions in general.

They are at the mercy of the powers of the day. The law is, once again, only for the small fries. If the illegal depot was operated by a nobody, they would have long been imprisoned.

This sovereign contempt for the law and institutions burst forth from the mouth of the PSD mayor of Caracal when he said about the dozens of injured firefighters that „it’s their problem.”

Doldurea later apologized, saying he reacted „under the influence of emotions and devastated by the news received,” but his disdain perfectly reflects the arrogance of the party he belongs to when it comes to power.

„Is it their problem” that even today, eight years after the Colectiv incident, Romania doesn’t have a burn hospital, and that victims have to be transported abroad for treatment? How is this possible? „Is it their problem” that the PSD led the country for most of that time but didn’t care? How can they sleep at night after such negligence?

Alexandra Furnea, a survivor of the Colectiv club fire, wrote Saturday night on her Facebook page that hospitals are still unprepared, and nosocomial infections continue to kill.

„Is it their problem” that the PSD appoints cronies to hospital management positions, and that in Botoșani a pregnant woman died after being left to scream for seven hours: „I can’t breathe”?

It doesn’t seem to be Prime Minister Ciolacu’s problem either.

The PSD leader responded on Sunday, irritated by questions about the PSD mayor of Caracal, the father of the owner of the GPL depot in Crevedia: „I am also someone’s son; each of us is someone’s child. It’s not within my job duties to contact anyone’s father.”

So, yes, it’s as the mayor of Caracal said: It’s their problem, the firefighters’ problem that they risked their lives to save people from a disaster caused by a party business.

They, the politicians, have no problem; they mind their own businesses, their group interests, corruption, and they defend each other.

Only we have a problem. THEIR corruption kills us.