Entire sections of civil society are seething with anger. In stand-by for months, after staging mass protests last February against the now infamous government order no. 13 to amend the criminal codes, people are now regrouping to voice their discontent against the leftist government in Bucharest.<\/p>\n
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On Sunday, tens of thousands of people braved the cold to gather in front of the government and Parliament headquarters and protest against the judicial reforms proposed by the Social Democrats, reforms which, protesters say, will ensure protection to corrupt politicians whose only goal is to \u201csave their skin\u201d. Even representatives of the judicial system say the proposed amendments to the justice laws will have a profound effect on efforts to eradicate corruption. But let\u2019s hear from the demonstrators themselves:<\/p>\n
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\u201cIf things continue in the direction in which they have been going for the last year, Romania will become an unpleasant place to live for the people trying to live a free and quality life. What I\u2019m hoping these protests will achieve is making the population aware that things can easily slip into the wrong direction.\u201d<\/p>\n
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\u201cIt\u2019s too much having a single group deciding on behalf of a mass of people.\u201d<\/p>\n
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Track 3: \u201cFor the last more than 300 days, something unacceptable has been happening almost every day.\u201d<\/p>\n
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Protests were held on Sunday not only in Bucharest but also in other big cities across the country. The bone of contention, apart from the amendment to the justice laws, is the change of the tax code. People chanted anti-government slogans and demanded the resignations of the Speakers of the Chamber of Deputies and the Senate, Liviu Dragnea and Calin Popescu Tariceanu, respectively, who are also the leaders of the two ruling parties, the Social Democratic Party and the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats.<\/p>\n
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The latter speaks of a witch-hunt, the involvement of the secret services in collecting evidence against politicians and the existence of a so-called \u201cillegitimate parallel state\u201d that is trying to decapitate the democratically elected government. Protesters, who see these claims as absurd, say they will continue to demonstrate.<\/p>\n
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Staged, via social networks, by around 40 groups and non-governmental organisations, these protests have also been supported for the first time starting last week by two big trade union confederations, Cartel Alfa and the National Trade Union Bloc.<\/p>\n
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In a joint press release, the latter denounce the \u201cpolitical mafia, theft, inefficiency, chaos and lack of transparency\u201d.<\/p>\n
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The leaders of the ruling coalition are fighting the ghost of a parallel state, which they themselves invented. Protesters say it is in fact they who live in a parallel reality!<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Tens of thousands of people have taken to the streets in Bucharest and other cities to protest against the judicial overhaul proposed by the Social Democratic government<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":109,"featured_media":75608,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[37738],"tags":[32917,28990],"coauthors":[],"class_list":["post-75607","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-today-in-the-news","tag-judicial-overhaul","tag-protests"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n