<alter-ee> romania

[caf fac]

C.A.F. is an initiative group of young people: boys and girls, whose number is 
unfortunately influenced by the social and political conditions in Romania. C.A.F. 
appeared in 1997 from the remains of the dead "Underground Movement", 
due to the need of action to radicalize the movement of the youth in our town 
and in order to offer a real alternative and to oppose a resistance at least as 
much as the oppression. So, C.A.F remains a small group of action, underground 
for the moment, which decided to get to the light through its deeds. Short history 
In Craiova the punk movement appeared in the first half of the ‘80s, strongly 
related to the anarchist ideas, being from the begining more than a musical movement. 
It represented a moment of change for the youth of that days, being the idea from 
which the solidarity in the fight for liberty -in a totalitarian system- was born. 
In those dark years the communist propaganda spoke to us about the Western World’s 
decline, giving as examples the punk groups made up by "no future" young 
people and bands with left sided ideas. This doesn’t mean that the repressive 
organs in Romania would have accepted something like this in our country, although 
the youth here had the same problems due to the complete failure of the communist 
experiment. In the last communist years the unemployment, the lack of houses and 
food ( although they were rationalized on a card, they didn’t exist), the lack 
of things to wear of decent quality, the cult of the leader’s paranoic personality, 
the abuse of the repressive organs, the total destruction of man’s personality, 
had transformed the everyday life in a black concentration camp. Thus our fight 
for liberty was based on a profound hate against the so called communism. The 
red flag with the sickle and the hammer represented and represents the nazi flag 
with swastika. In school we received an anti - racist education and even an ecological 
one, while the politic regime was exactly at the other pole, a stupid ultranationalism 
which persecuted gypsies and hungarians, doubled by a forced industrialization 
which destroyed the environment. After the Revolution (1989), we slowly began 
to learn what capitalism meant in Romania, the terror of the state property slowly 
switched in to the terror of the private property. The former members of "the 
Party" and the most greedy "important" people took advantage of 
the chaos of the first years of transition. The State still remain very powerful, 
this "democracy" is nothing but another form of totalitarism, the control 
and repression are maybe more efficient then in the communist years. The society 
and the individual continue to be the main target of the manipulation, propaganda 
and of the dehumanization. The capitalist promises for a prosperous future, that 
requires huge sacrifices in the present, prove to be simple utopias, but the public 
opinion is disinformed and prevented from finding an alternative. The phantom 
of communism and now the terrorist threats make almost impossible a resistance 
movement. After ’89, the young punks in Craiova tried to create their own alternative, 
their own future, in a different way from the society. At the beginning of the 
‘90s the Underground Movement was created, and using the pretext of promoting 
the punk music, tried to create a subculture of resistance. Even from the beginning, 
the punk concerts were forbidden, but the police harsh intervention needed a more 
radical response. Once created, this punk scene was used to promote anarchist 
ideas. We understood that the alternative can't b’ built in parallel to an intolerant 
society and with the state. In this way our fight was a double one: on one hand 
we tried to maintain the individuality but also the solidarity, on the other hand 
we tried to destroy the preconceived ideas and the social conventions. >From 
the search for our own personality we realized the necessity of a total liberty. 
Thus we became the contestants of the society of consumers.  The moment our 
movement became stronger, and our alternative was more visible, and this example 
became that dangerous that the state used its repressive force to protect the 
nonvalues imposed by the society imitating the western capitalism. In 1997 most 
of the mass - media started a huge denigration campaign of the Underground members. 
We got used to accusations of satanism, the principal one being of gathering new 
members and that of anarcho-terrorism. Taking advantage of the big number of members 
and sympathizers, more or less than 50, we created a spontaneous public protest 
in the center down town. We tried to explain that we are a cultural and non-politic 
movement. The press didn’t take us serious and the police let us believe that 
we won’t be punished for that protest.. Even from 1996 the Secret Services tried 
to create informers inside the Underground Movement. They put pressure on the 
families, they went in our schools or work places so that many of the members 
were intimidated and returned to a normal life. Although we have been continually 
harassed by the police and the Secret Services, this didn’t do anything but to 
strengthen our will to fight. We started to communicate more with the ones in 
other towns like Timisoara and Bucharest. We try to coordinate as much as possible 
our actions. For the moment, because of the small number of people implicated 
and the ignorance or the bad will of the other people, our action mainly aim at 
sensitizing of the public opinion, to the exposure of the lies and of the noxiousness 
of the capitalist society, of the policies of the parties (right or left) and 
at anarchist propaganda. We try to make people more interested in what happens 
around them or with their own person and their true needs, destroying the selfishness 
myth and that of false competition. More precisely, we are speaking about magazines, 
pamphlets, graffiti, punk concerts and (not rarely) about direct confrontations 
with the ones trying to limitate our freedom. Now we are followed everywhere by 
Secret Services agents and things become harder to be done. Despite all these, 
we succeeded in doing something that attracted the attention of the public opinion. 
During the election campaign from 2000, there was the threat that the leader of 
the extreme right party - V.C. Tudor, a little bit stalinist, a little bit hitlerist 
- might become the president. We had to take attitude and after we were allowed 
to demonstrate against the extreme right ideas by the local authorities, we got 
out in the streets - about 30 people - with red and black flags and antifascist 
banners. We talked to the passer-by and we did a small test: a hundred people 
signed against, and only one signed on the pro-fascist list. Many people sympathized 
with us while the gypsies were really interested in becoming members of our movement, 
as they had been directly threatened to be exterminated. It didn’t matter that 
the press ignored all this event because we succeeded in expressing our ideas. 
Unfortunately we became again "too dangerous", and the authorities tempered 
us, destroying the bound between the members once more. We had to get used to 
the small underground actions done with serious compromises. Instead we took part 
at the actions in Timisoara, one of the most successful being "Food Not Bombs", 
a tour around the city which stopped in front of the McDonald’s and which transformed 
into a real public discussion against militarization and war. In september 2001, 
we tried to organize in Craiova an Alternative Art Festival to which we invited 
many foreign bands (from USA, Germany, Croatia, Yugoslavia). In the last moment 
the authorities succeeded in stopping us by puting great pressure on the people 
that would have rented us the necessary piece of land. Finally, we had to be satisfied 
that we had at least a concert, with the police at the entry. We, somehow, were 
happy because we established friendly relationships with guys from other countries. 
On May the 1st 2002 we got from the authorities permission for a photo and paintings 
exhibition, to take place in one of Craiova’s squares. More over, we also placed 
special spots for slogans, red and black flags and distributed propaganda materials 
and most important - we also organized a Food Not Bombs action, we gave food and 
clothes to the poor people. These and the 50 members attracted the attention of 
the public and the press. Next, we took part to a meeting that took place during 
the biggest syndicate strike in the last 15 years. Unfortunately, we were only 
20 people. The policemen tried to prevent us from entering the center of the town 
were the demonstration was. Unexpectedly the syndicalist workers and other people 
in the streets defended us so we could participate to the event. We distributed 
pieces of writing that were widely accepted by the participants to the meeting 
which truly manifested their sympathy to us. This time, the press was especially 
interested in the presence of the anarchists. On this ocasion we succeeded in 
proving to the people that the anarchist movement in Craiova does not represent 
a threat for them and that it is made up of pupils, students and workers who have 
the same problems as they do and who try to help them or even gather them in their 
fight for a better life. Our implication in this manifest didn’t do anything but 
to worsen our relationship with the authorities. This last important event that 
we took part in, happened exactly when the Secret Romanian Service completed their 
report about the anarchist organizations, sustaining that they died and that their 
members deal with drugs, pornography, child abuses, zoofily and extreme violence. 
Some C.A.F. members took part to the anti-racist and anti-fascist demonstrations 
and camps this summer in Germany, being invited by our friends in Weimar. They 
also participated together with the members of Barricada from Boston at the No 
Border Camp and demonstrations in Strasbourg, France. For the moment we are passing 
again through a bad period due to the financial problems, the internal lack of 
understanding and not the least because of the authorities threats. We hope that 
this period will pass as soon as possible and that our fight won’t stop only to 
surviving. For us there is no resignation, but death. Antiwar demo in first march. 
Is a whole story about how we can organize this kind of protest now when all mainstream 
media are against us and all the state propaganda is focusing on nato integration. 
We were forced to colaborate with a troskist-marxist organization called asociation 
for the workers emancipation. Some of the lithers of this organization are friends 
of us and maybe they want to change something and have a little trust in us. But 
the big majority of them are old senile and they can not do anything. But with 
them help we can take the approbation from the authorities. When we start the 
organize and the work to the banners and placardes C.A.F. was very active. In 
the beginning we were not very enthuziastic because we thought we will can not 
say what we want to say. But instead we done all the job so the things became 
more anarchist than reformist. But the situation was really saved by our true 
comarades from aactivist collective from Timisoara. They were well prepared the 
number of participance was 100. At least a half were anarchists, less than 10 
troskists and the reast were just punk-rockers. ( we hope this punks to become 
more involved in anarcho-punk movement ). The flags were red and black and the 
people from our city ( also the police) know this was an anarchists protest. About 
the impact we are very pleasent because many young people participated and were 
interested about anarchism. This is good for our "ghetto" but is good 
also for public opinion because, even if we can not chnage their ideas about the 
war at least we change our distorsed image. Now they see us like an well organized 
group and for this maybe they respect us more. Is important to say that the majority 
of people on the street was not against us friends from aactivist collective were 
very unhappy because they belived the media give any attention to the troskists. 
Fortunately massmedia is interested " only about anarchists". And this 
time the local tv made a good report, another tv station called us nostalgic hippies 
but they are not against us.We will try to keep the people mobilized and " 
angry". ANARCHY IS THE ONLY WAY TO FREEDOM