The National Tourism Authority - An Analysis of Law Breaking

We bring to your attention the following regarding the regulations promoted by the National Tourism Authority (Autoritatea Nationala pentru Turism) [in Romania] for the allotment of the Commercial Societies for Tourism, and for the separate sale of their assets and afferent business activities:

1) Some of these assets (i.e., hotels, chalets in resort towns, mountain cabins, restaurants, stores) became public properties following abusive confiscation by the communist governments, and are currently being reclaimed, or are reclaimable by their former owners and their inheritors;
2) After 1989, the [Romanian] Parliament and various succeeding governments voted special laws, some with well defined deadlines, to regulate the [legal] status of buildings other than those intended for private residence (see ANNEX);
3) Some of these laws have not been passed yet, and some others were actually repealed, therefore allowing for trading in those assets. Many factors contributed to this outcome including the intensive lobbing by various interest groups that were aiming at owning those properties, the inefficient [Romanian] justice system, and the lack of financial resources required by the former owners for successful repossession of their properties;
4) The numerous appeals send directly or via the mass media to the [Romanian] political and administrative establishments by associations, foundations, and organizations fighting for the recovery of confiscated properties were unsuccessful, although the restitution of these properties did not require the protection of tenants;
5) The decision to proceed with the sale of the previously mentioned assets prior to determining their real legal status will lead to the following:

a) The non-observance by the [Romanian] State of its own pledges (see ANNEX) to settle the [legal] status of the previously mentioned assets;
b) The violation of the [Romanian] Constitution, [Romanian] Civil Code, and the international treaties adopted by Romania;
c) The misleading of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe by not fulfilling the provisions of the Resolution no.1123 from April 24th, 1997;
d) The Overlooking of the Resolution no.562 of the United States Congress regarding the restitution of confiscated properties [to their lawful owners]
e) The deceit of the [Romanian] citizens that have been confidently waiting for the restoration of property rights, and the restitution of reclaimed property via promised official rights;
f)  The placement of the governmental institution, that would complete the sale of reclaimed and reclaimable assets and their business activities prior to resolving their legal status, in the category of mala fide sellers.

In light of all mentioned above, we request the following [from the Romanian Government and Parliament]:

1) To end all sales of the reclaimed and reclaimable assets and their [afferent] business activities, that are part of the Commercial Societies of Tourism or in the possession of the State Property Fund (Fondul Proprietatii de Stat), Financial Investment Societies, and [other] Commercial Societies;
2) To observe the provisions mentioned in Articles no.4 and no.17 of the Governmental Urgent Order no.32 (see ANNEX, item 8) until a resolution regarding those assets is completed;
3) To reduce the public worth of the assets owned by the Commercial Societies of Tourism by the total value of the above mentioned confiscated properties;
4) To co-opt the former owners' representatives into the process of designing the legal framework dealing with the restitution of properties confiscated abusively by the [communist] state.

Please note that the [list of] properties reclaimed by their former owners or their inheritors [is] being constantly communicated and updated on the Internet and in written memos. All confiscated assets that are being sold by the [Romanian] State will join the above mentioned lists of confiscated properties.

In the hope that our requests will be understood, please write your opinion to our addresses in the United States or Romania:

Mircea Corivan, CPP Vice-president
Calea Mosilor nr.256, Bloc 2, Scara 1, Sector 1, Bucuresti, Romania
Tel/Fax 40 1 205.38.00

CPP P.O. Box 103
Pompton Plains, NJ 07444
cpp@romhome.org

Annex

The following is a list of the normative acts [adopted in Romania] that addressed the issue of the confiscated properties other than those intended for private residence:

1) Law no.58/1991 entitled "The Privatization of Commercial Societies", provided in Article no.77 the following: "compensations foe abusively confiscated goods will be established by a special law". (This law was repealed by Law no.44/1998.) ;

2) Law no.112/1995 entitled "The Law for the Regulation of the Legal Status of Some Buildings Intended for Private Residence and Confiscated by the State" provided in Article no.25 the following: "special laws will regulate the legal status of buildings other than the ones covered by Law no.112/1995 which were confiscated by the [Romanian] State prior to 1989 regardless of their initially intended use, including the ones demolished for public use". (This provision is unfulfilled to date.);

3) The Urgent Order no.37/1997 published in Monitorul Oficial (Official Gazette of the Romanian Government) no.150/1997 for expediting the privatization process provided in Article III, Item 3 the following: "the method and procedure for assigning compensations for the goods abusively confiscated by the [Romanian] State will be regulated by a special law to be elaborated by the government within sixty days from the date when the current Urgent Order comes into operation". (The deadline expired on September 11th , 1997, and the Urgent Order no.37/1997 was repealed by the New Privatization Law no.44/1998.);

4) The Urgent Order no.88/1997 approved via Law no.44/1998 regarding "The Privatization of Commercial Societies" established the following: "the status of the assets intended for commercial use, that were taken into state ownership according to laws and normative acts of [private property] nationalization, was to be regulated within sixty days from the publishing date of this law". (The February 23rd, 1998 deadline passed unfulfilled.)

5) The Governmental Decision no.140 approving the strategy for the "privatization of commercial societies in 1998" was published in Monitorul Oficial no.139 on March 7th, 1998, and provided in Chapter VI (entitled "Policies for Sectional Privatization"), Section 9 (entitled "Tourism"), Item 3, Paragraph b the following: "the [commercial] societies whose assets include confiscated real estate should decrease their estimated worth prior to privatization by the value of those confiscated real estate until the legal status of that real estate is settled". (This provision is unfulfilled to date.);

6) The Governmental Decision no.362 published in Monitorul Oficial no.247 on July 3rd, 1998 altered the strategy approved by the Governmental Decision no.140 [see Item 5 above], and provided in Chapter III (entitled "Improvement in the Legal and Institutional Framework") for the elaboration without a deadline of a special law to regulate the status of confiscated goods. (This provision is unfulfilled to date.);

7) The Parliamentary Decision no.6 from April 15th, 1998, published in Monitorul Oficial no.152 on April 16th, 1998, which confirmed the government led by [Prime Minister] Radu Vasile, also approved the government's proposed legislative program. That program stated in Chapter VII (entitled "Policies Regarding the Justice System and the Protection of the Citizen"), Item 3 that one of the duties of the [Romanian] Ministry of Justice was to design by December 31st, 1998 the legal framework for either the restitution in kind of some real estate assets confiscated by the [communist] state after March 6th, 1945, or for the compliance, whenever the equitable restitution was not possible, with the Resolution no.1123 from April 24th, 1997 of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe. (This measure is unfulfilled to date.)

8) The Governmental Urgent Order no.32 regarding the privatization of Commercial Societies of Tourism published in Monitorul Oficial no.436 on November 17th, 1998 provided for the partition of these societies in Chapter III (entitled "The Preceding Procedure for the Privatization of Commercial Societies of Tourism"), Article no.4, Item 1, Paragraph 4. It stated the need for "the separation of the assets that were confiscated by the [communist] state in accordance with [private property] nationalization laws and normative acts, and whose legal status was going to be regulated by a special law". Moreover, [the Urgent Order no.32] stated categorically in Chapter VI (entitled "Transient and Final Stipulations"), Article no.17 the following:

"ASSETS THAT WERE CONFISCATED BY THE STATE ACCORDING TO [PRIVATE PROPERTY] NATIONALIZATION LAWS OR NORMATIVE ACTS, AND ARE PART OF THE COMMERCIAL SOCIETIES OF TOURISM IN WHICH THE STATE IS A SHAREHOLDER CAN BE TRADED IF THEY ARE NOT RECLAIMED WITHIN ONE YEAR FROM THE DATE OF PUBLICATION OF THIS URGENT ORDER."


Translation by:
Alexandru C. Bageac, M.D.
Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center
Harvard Medical School