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- <text id=90TT1417>
- <link 90TT0044>
- <link 90TT0013>
- <title>
- June 04, 1990: World Notes:Romania
- </title>
- <history>
- TIME--The Weekly Newsmagazine--1990
- June 04, 1990 Gorbachev:In The Eye Of The Storm
- </history>
- <article>
- <source>Time Magazine</source>
- <hdr>
- WORLD, Page 65
- World Notes
- ROMANIA
- Iliescu Wins Big
- </hdr>
- <body>
- <p> With a 94% turnout and 85% of the vote in elections last
- week, President-elect Ion Iliescu of Romania was almost in the
- same league as his predecessor, Nicolae Ceausescu, the
- Communist tyrant who posted similar landslides in pro forma
- balloting. But this was a free election, complete with
- opposition candidates and Western observers. That must have made
- Iliescu's victory all the sweeter, despite opposition
- allegations of ballot-box fraud, voter intimidation and media
- monopolization by his incumbent National Salvation Front.
- </p>
- <p> Iliescu's background as a former senior Communist Party
- official failed to outweigh the personal popularity he has won
- since the Front came to power last December. Working in his
- favor were generous food imports, an end to miserly controls
- over heat and light, and a go-slow approach to economic reform
- that has so far avoided layoffs and higher prices. The relative
- obscurity of his opposition rivals and their lack of support
- among rural and industrial workers also helped. Iliescu has
- said he will model Romania's economy on that of Sweden, while
- retaining government control of heavy industry and
- agriculture. Having shed the corrupt Ceausescu, Romanians seem
- in less of a hurry to discard communism.
- </p>
-
- </body>
- </article>
- </text>
-
-