The National Day marked in Romania
Romania on Monday celebrated 96 years since the unification of December 1st 1918.
Roxana Vasile, 02.12.2014, 15:43
Romanians worldwide on Monday celebrated December 1, the National Day of Romania. Religious ceremonies, military parades, concerts or cocktail parties were held all across the country. In Bucharest, over 2,700 military, police officers, gendarmes, fire fighters and employees of the Romanian Intelligence Service and the Protection and Security Service, in addition to some 280 combat vehicles paraded in front of the Parliament Palace, the second-largest in the world after the Pentagon.
Due to bad weather, Air Forces aircraft would not lift off. The snow and cold did not however keep Bucharesters at home. For the first time Moldovan soldiers were invited to take part in the pageant. Joining them were military from France, Poland, Turkey and the United States. In his speech at the last reception he hosted as president, Traian Basescu told the political class it would not win over citizens’ confidence as long as they did not serve national interests.
Traian Basescu: “Today politicians must understand that Romanians first and foremost want the rule of law, equal rights before the justice system, health care for everyone, education and motorways. Any politician failing to see this will in the next few years be cast out by the people”.
In turn, president elect Klaus Iohannis, whose term in office is starting on December 22, attended the ceremony in the Western-central city of Alba Iulia, the place where 96 years ago, at the end of World War I, the Romanian unitary state was set up, incorporating all the provinces with predominantly Romanian speaking populations that back then were part of the neighbouring multi-national empires.
Iohannis conveyed the following message to Romanians: “Together we will rediscover the idea of national unity. What does this concept mean? It means the commitment to achieve national goals, it means joint action towards that end and rebuilding lost trust”.
In neighboring Ukraine and Hungary, in Italy, Spain, France or overseas, Romanians all over the world celebrated their national day. We talked to a few people to find out what their hopes are for the future: “I want a more beautiful and better-organized Romania, whose leaders should succeed in bringing all our co-nationals abroad back home in the shortest time possible”.
“I want everyone to be happy, to have strength and vision, to believe in a modern and European Romania, where every citizen is important, no matter where he is”.
