Transylvania is like CATALONIA with vampires.
Yep, you heard that right.
The land where Dracula was born is also the place of one of the most significant separatists
conflicts in all of Europe.
In other words…
Transylvania is the perfect place to make a VisualPolitik Halloween special.
And…
yes, I know what you are thinking.
We read your comments and we know you want a video about Catalonia...
And I’ll tell you what!
We are going make it, it’s just big, and it’s complicated, and I promise it will
be worth the wait…
For now, let’s get back to Transylvania, a historical region situated in the centre
of Romania.
Despite being in this country, 20% of its population doesn’t even speak Romanian.
Instead, Hungarian is their mother language.
In some areas, the number of Hungarian-speaking people rises to 80%.
This area where the Hungarians are the majority is called as SZEKELY LAND.
Almost every year you can see massive protests of Szekelies demanding more autonomy for their
territory.
These demonstrations are celebrated in the main cities of Transylvania as well as Bucharest,
the Romanian capital, and Budapest, the Hungarian capital.
But wait a minute because things are far more complicated that they seem!
In fact, Szekelys don’t want to have their own country.
Instead, they want to become a special region inside of Romania, with a very specific fiscal
system.
So the question here is…
Why does this cause so many problems for Romania?
Why are these demands causing such a significant diplomatic conflict?
And more importantly…
What does the Hungarian government have to do with this?
Well, today we are going to answer all of these questions.
But before we do that let’s take a look at the history.
HAIRY TONGUES
For centuries, Transylvania was part of the Kingdom of Hungary.
Back then, Romania wasn’t even a country.
The upper classes and the aristocracy spoke Hungarian and Romanian was the language spoken
by the peasants.
At some points in history, Romanian speakers were even prosecuted by the authorities.
We call this process the MAGYARIZATION.
Basically, the Hungarian rulers wanted to impose their culture at any cost.
To those aristocrats, Romanians were sort of hillbillies who had a special love for
stealing things and a bad sense of personal hygiene...
In fact, there was even a term to refer these Romanians...
They were called Szőrös nyelvu which, literally means, ‘with a hairy tongue’.
During the 19th century, the Government closed Romanian speaking newspapers and they even
forced a lot of citizens to change their Romanian name to a Hungarian one.
Nonetheless, things changed after the end of World War I.
The Austro-Hungarian empire lost the war.
And one of the things that happens when you lose a war is that you usually lose parts
of your territory too.
One of those parts was Transylvania, which was incorporated into Romania.
Suddenly, those peasants that were oppressed by the Hungarian nobility had power.
And, well, they wanted revenge.
This is how the first attempts to destroy the Hungarian culture started.
And oh boy, it was not an easy job…
Don’t forget that, despite being part of Romania, Transylvania was the home of over
1 million Hungarian speaking people.
These were called the SZEKELIS and for generations have been speaking the language of ISTVAN
ORKENY.
But things got really a lot uglier during World War II.
Hungary once again chose the wrong side to ally with.
With Hitler’s help, they took back their former territories and struck back against
those who wanted to erase Hungarian culture in the country.
As you can imagine, this helped to make the Romanians even more angry.
Then, in 1945, the Germans lost the war.
That included their allies and, of course, the Hungarians.
So Romania, with a brand new communist government took Transylvania back.
This time, with an even bigger taste for a payback.
Maybe you remember this other video where I told you about the dictatorship of Nicolae
Ceausescu?
If you have seen it, you already know the Communist Romania was the closest thing to
a European North Korea.
1 out of 30 Romanians were part of the political police, and they prosecuted not only those
who opposed the government, but even those who dared to speak Hungarian.
From one day to the other, Ceaucescu closed newspapers and forced those Szekelys to speak
Romanian even in their own homes.
Magyarization, bad as it was, forced a few Romanians to change their names.
Romanization was the same sort of thing, just on a way bigger scale.
But hold on a minute because it doesn’t stop here!
On their path to destroy even the last resemblance of Hungarian culture, the Romanian Communist
Party forced thousands of citizens to set in the Hungarian speaking territories.
This way, Hungarian speaking became a small minority in cities like ORADEA or SATU MARE.
Basically, the whole area that borders with Hungary became a Romanian majority region.
Nonetheless, there is a region that managed to keep their language and traditions in tact,
and that is the so-called SZEKELY LAND.
ROMANIA STEALS FROM US!
In 1991, Romania passed their brand new democratic constitution.
This constitution recognized the right to speak Hungarian.
But, as you can imagine, after decades of hate against Budapest, those szekelys were
far from happy.
Think about it, fiscally, Romania is a very centralized country.
Almost all the taxes are collected by the central government and then, they share that
money among the regions, with a focus on the poorest ones.
This puts Transylvania in a very bad position, and that’s because they are wealthier than
the other regions...
And this, well this, is how a new political party was born: the Democratic Alliance of
Hungarians of Romania, also known as the UDMR.
Unsurprisingly, they won all the elections in regions where Hungarians are the majority...
So, what are their foundations?
Basically, they claim Romania is sucking their blood… and their money.
Yes… it is the same as in the Catalonian case!
And their solution to end Romanian looting is… imitating the fiscal model of another
Spanish region: the BASQUE country.
Let me explain to you what happens here for a moment.
The Basque Country is a region inside of Spain with a very special tax system.
Unlike the other regions, the Basque citizens don’t pay their taxes to Madrid but to their
local government instead.
Once the money is collected, the local government has to give some share to the central government.
But the rest is to be managed the way the local government wants…
Alright, so back to Transylvania.
So, this was the system proposed by the Szekelys in 2014.
And guess what the Romanian government replied…
Well, they say it was against the constitution.
The Romanian Constitution starts by saying that that is a sovereign, unitary and in-di-vi-si-ble
country.
Of course, this created lots of protests in different cities.
There were referendum attempts and all sorts of other symbolic objection...
These are all things that hurt the Romanian ruling class.
ROMANIA’S RULING PARTY THREATENS AUTONOMY-SEEKING TRANSYLVANIAN-HUNGARIANS WITH PRISON PUNISHMENT
Attempts that threaten the constitutional order of Romania should be punished with prison.
If you’ve been following the case of the Catalonian separatists, this might sound familiar
to you...
Well, hold on a second because the best is still yet to come..
AUTONOMY OR ANEXION?
If anybody of you has ever been to Hungary, I’m sure you might have seen someone wearing
a T-Shirt with this map.
It represents the shape of Hungary before losing part of their territories before the
World War I. Yes, even today, in the 21st century, a lot of Hungarians keep dreaming
about taking their old empire back.
Among them there is their president, VIKTOR ORBAN, the Vladimir Putin of the Danube.
Just like the Russian President, Orban is famous for prosecuting the journalists who
dare to criticize him.
He has passed anti gay-laws and wins elections with over 60% the vote.
And, of course, like every good ‘Putinist,’ Orban likes to rule not only his own country,
but others too.
“Orban supports the autonomy of the szekelis”
OK, I know what you are thinking…
Why does a President from another country mess with the internal politics of another?
At the end of the day, what the Szekelys want is just to have more autonomy but… without
leaving Romania, right?
Well… in fact… those Szekely citizens are also his citizens.
Hungary Grants Citizenship Rights To Ethnic Hungarians Abroad.
Yep, you heard that right.
All those Transylvanian-born Hungarians have two passports, the right to study in Hungary
and, of course, vote at Hungarian elections.
This last thing is especially good for Orban.
He is popular inside of Hungarian borders, but outside, he absolutely steals the show...
95% of Hungarians from abroad voted for his party, the FIDESZ, at the latest legislative
elections.
Meanwhile, Romania considers those rights for the Szekelys as a complete violation of
their own sovereignty.
In their opinion, if you vote in two different countries, you can’t be loyal to the one
where you live.
All of this means the diplomatic relations between Hungary and Romania are complicated...
Thanks to this, Orban can use Romania as an antagonist to his nationalist propaganda.
And then Romania has a great chance to give some Hungary some shit when it comes to European
politics.
And now you might be wondering…
What does the European Union think about all of this?
The truth is that despite the Council of Europe writing memorandums where they defend the
rights of ethnic minorities, Brussels would never let Hungary win.
At the end of the day, Viktor Orban is like Dracula, Frankenstein and Freddy Krueger of
European politics.
So, as long as things don’t turn ugly, don’t expect any position from any EU institution
or politician.
But now this is your turn…
Do you think Transylvania should have its own autonomy?
Or, perhaps, this is
nothing by a attempt from Hungary to get back its sway on their former territories?
Please, leave your answer on the comment section below.
Meanwhile, if you want to know more about the old Romanian communist system and the
current Romanian corrupt system, don’t forget to click on the video that appears at the
end of this one.
Also, visit RECONSIDER MEDIA.COM, the podcast that provided the voices on this video that
are not mine.
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I wish you a terrific Halloween!!!!