Foreign architects come to help Bucharest stop from its unhealthy development. Foreign banks lobby for Romania in Brussels. Back home, Romania wastes money and resources. Local administration fines drivers for not having a parking lot in Bucharest. In the countryside, there are no fines, because cars can't access remote villages. Not even the emergency services.
Bucharest Mayor Sorin Oprescu put up a commission formed by 19 Romanian and foreign specialists, searching for solutions to transform Bucharest in a decent city, Evenimentul Zilei reads. The Commission for Urban Development and Policies is made of architects, urbanism specialists, construction, finance and social sciences experts. The city needs a vision, they say, on what Bucharest can be - a green city, a rock and roll city, a balneary destination or a patrimony city. As soon as the commission was put up, its members were astonished by the lack of laws, the strange relation between the City Hall and districts' administration, as well as the lack of instruments to put to practice whatever plan the commission may design.
Speaking of officials: the recently named Governmental spokesman, Rares Niculescu, was fined for starting a fight in a club in Cluj, where he went to party along with two friends, all newspapers note. Evenimentul Zilei and Cotidianul sanction the incident in similar manners: "The Government's scandalmonger", is the title in Evenimentul, while Cotidianul prefers "The Governmental Fistperson".
The best news at this beginning of the week is that Switzerland decided to maintain the free movement rights for EU citizens and to expand it to Romanians and Bulgarians, despite the aggressive campaign of the Swiss Popular Party (SVP) before the scrutiny. 59.6% of the citizens voted in favor of expanding the rights to Romanians and Bulgarians, Gandul and most other pap
