Former Romanian Prime Minister Victor Ponta caused a scandal by declaring that he deliberately flooded Romanian villages in 2014 to save Belgrade, which he claims earned him Serbian citizenship and an avalanche of political attacks ahead of the presidential elections.
Former Prime Minister Victor Ponta, who is currently running for president as an independent candidate with an isolationist agenda, claimed that in his capacity as head of the executive power in 2014, he prevented the flooding of Belgrade by opening the Djerdap gorge dam so that several Romanian villages would be flooded instead of the Serbian capital, writes Danas.
He said that the government paid compensation for the damage caused on the territory of Romania and assured that no one was endangered during the operation.
For that, Serbia granted him citizenship, claims Ponta in a podcast broadcast by the daily newspaper Evenimentul Zilei on April 9, Romania Insider reported.
"No Romanian in Romania was in danger, no household was seriously affected - but we saved hundreds, maybe even thousands of lives in Serbia, members of a neighboring nation that loves Romanians," Victor Ponta wrote on Facebook.
Hidroelektrika, the Romanian power company, announced that the Djerdap Gorge on the Danube was operating in May 2014 in accordance with the provisions of the Romanian-Serbian Convention.
The operation of the Hydropower and Navigation System Djerdap Gorge I and Djerdap Gorge II (SHEN), in the period from May 18 to 26, 2014, when the Danube flows reached values of over 11.500 cubic meters/s, which is the situation foreseen by the Romanian-Serbian documents, was carried out in full accordance with the provisions of the Labor Convention from 1998 and the Rules of the Joint Dispatch Service for Energy, Hidroelektrika announced on Thursday, Romania Journal reported.
Ponta disappointed the electorate
As Romania Insider writes, the direct beneficiaries of Ponta's unexpected statements are far-right presidential candidate Đorđe Simion (Ponta's rival and the leading candidate in the May 4 and 18 elections), as well as the ruling coalition candidate Crin Antonescu, who also shares part of the electorate with Ponta and hopes to make it to the second round of voting.
It remains unclear, it is said, why Victor Ponta decided to make such statements. Officially, he explained how he got Serbian citizenship. However, the price of disclosing this information both when it comes to elections and when it comes to politics is very high.
Ponta is now losing ground among his nationalist electorate in favor of his rival Djordje Simion, this media reports. Moreover, all the other presidential candidates attacked him on the subject.
G4Media and Info Sud-Est conducted surveys on dozens of TikTok and Facebook pages with supporters of EU skeptic Calin Djordescu - who is still considered the spiritual leader of the isolationist movement even though he is not running in the presidential elections - and concluded that Victor Ponta is quickly losing ground.
After Ponta's claims about preventing the flooding of Belgrade at the cost of several Romanian villages, Romanian Prime Minister Marcel Colaku appealed to Ponta to give up the presidential campaign.
"As a prime minister, you often have to make difficult decisions. But you should never keep them a secret. Admitting without hesitation, after a number of years, that you agreed as the prime minister of Romania to flood Romanian villages to protect foreign cities and that you are proud to have received the citizenship of another country as a reward, makes you anything but a sovereignist!", said Prime Minister Colaku in a post on Facebook.
Reacting to the Prime Minister's statement, Victor Ponta warned Cholaku that after winning the presidential elections, he would be replaced by someone else at the top of the executive branch.
"I think Čolak should resign as prime minister immediately - otherwise I will dismiss him as soon as I become president!", Ponta responded with another post on Facebook.
Reactions of other presidential candidates
Meanwhile, Bucharest Mayor Nikušor Dan, who is also running for president in May's elections, has asked Prime Minister Marcelo Colaku to release and declassify all documents underlying decisions made by Victor Ponta during the 2014 floods.
"Romanians have the right to know, transparently, what Victor Ponta's decision to flood Romanian villages along the Danube was based on," he said.
Crin Antonescu, the presidential candidate of the ruling PSD-PNL-UDMR alliance, also reacted to the news, criticizing Ponta in a message on social networks: "The fact that you were able to direct water to Romanian citizens without telling them, that you were able to ignore the advice of experts and flood Romanian villages, without warning anyone, and now you are proud of it - saying that, in return, you received "honorary" citizenship of another country while were the Prime Minister of Romania... It really defies imagination."
He also said that Romanians "deserve to know the extent of the betrayal," Digi24 reported.
The leader of the DREPT party, Vlad George, announced that he and his colleagues will file a criminal complaint against Victor Ponta for the crime of high treason, according to Agerpress.
Sources: Danas, Agerpres, Romania journal
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