Tag #133680 - Interview #100685 (Jozsef Farkas)

I remember these things, what happened to me, and what I went through. There were some measures then, which demanded that we had to remain in the factory and work overtime. I complied without further ado and stayed there even for three days and two nights, and I was alright. This wasn’t a problem when I was 19, 20, 21, because I was young and full of energy. On the other hand, at the end of 1989, a theory I heard shocked me. But later I realized it was a rule. Among others, we exported things. I had to report this on behalf of the factory, and I had to submit these reports. Every time I took these reports to Bucharest, they always shouted at me, ‘Change it, and add something to it!’ And I said calmly, ‘Do it yourself, if you want it! I won’t say anything if you…’ ‘No’ He said, ‘You have to write it.’ ‘I won’t write anything.’ And they changed the reports as they wanted. Once a counselor visited me and I said, ‘Hey, how is it possible that you order us to lie?’ ‘Calm down,’ he said, ‘We have been to the big boss, Ceausescu [14], and he gave this order: write as much as you want, because what you write will be done, if not on that day, than after a month.’ So I started thinking, ‘Hey, listen, how did we come to this that we have to do in 13 months what we have reported in 13 months?’ ‘If Ceausescu wants it this way, what can we do?’ We had to report a larger quantity than we produced, and had to comply because there was one instruction, and this came from above. 

When I was the manager of the Bobilna factory in Des, Ceausescu came there on his name-day [Editor’s note: on Nicolae’s, St. Nicholas day, in December], and they made us prepare for it with all kinds of stuff. We tried to do our best, and they checked our results first in Des, and then they sent them to Kolozsvar, where a local committee analyzed them. And there were a few occasions when our report passed through a second verification, the analysis from Kolozsvar, and then it was sent to Ceausescu. But welcoming Ceausescu and all the things were so forced. They took the whole factory two or three times to Kolozsvar, and we went by a special train at 3.30am, and at 6am we had to march to the Clujana [a shoe factory], and from there we marched to the Romanian Opera, and only came back in the afternoon.We were puppets.At Ceausescu’s last visit in Des at the Irta, I was appointed, as manager, to lay out the carpet he stepped on when he got down from the helicopter.I had to direct the operation of laying down the carpet, I had to take there twelve carpenters to nail down the carpet to prevent it from being lifted off by the turbulence made by the propeller of the helicopter.And the members of the securitate stood near us, each of them had a microphone on his arm, which looked like a watch, but they recorded everything with that.

I met Ceausescu personally in Des in 1970, during the flood, when the Szamos River flowed over its banks.He stopped at the company and spoke to me.He was very, very scared then, his face was white, he was very frightened.Because the flood was huge, there’s an inscription at the railway station, stating that the Szamos was 963cm there.He spoke briefly and very normally. He asked me about the consequences, if we had any victims or damages.I told him we had no victims at the company and he told us if there were any victims, we first had to save them and only after the properties.He said this, and I felt he was concerned about his orkerss.The flood claimed seven lives in Des then.As he went on, one of his men began to shout,‘Luati masuri imediat, incepeti productia!’[Take measures immediately and start the production!]This was despite the fact that 70 percent of the factory was under water.I said, ‘Da, am inteles.’[Yes, Sir.]I wouldn’t argue with such a person.

I had no problems with anyone during my career, due to my origins, or anything else.