In September 1999, following a newspaper advertisement by PwC Romania notifying the intent to sell my grandfather’s house (although COMTIM was never the owner of the house’s deed but only a tenant), I initiated a lawsuit against the Romanian State, COMTIM and its representatives (PwC Romania) in order to reclaim the ownership of my grandfather’s house.

In January 2002, I had a meeting with Mr. Radu Bufan and other COMTIM and PwC Romania representatives and the Judge that presides over the liquidation processes. The intent of the meeting as presented by Mr. Bufan was to evaluate an expedient way to resolve my claim. No such solution was ever offered, but it was used by PwC Romania to evaluate the threat that my action posed.

Far from following on its promises, PwC Romania through its legal counsel, Mr. Scrieciu, argued together with the legal representative of the Romanian State for the legality of the Nationalization act in front of the Court and requested that our action be denied. The obvious incongruence between PwC Romania’s position in this matter (pro-nationalization, the denial of the right to private property and enterprise) and the credo that stayed at the foundation of PwC 150 years ago (pro private property and free enterprise) is set conveniently aside.

In January 2000, we win the first decision; the Court found that the house was illegally nationalized even based on the 1950s Communist laws. However, relentless PwC Romania appeals the decision and with arguments that can bring smiles in almost any context, PwC Romania legal counsel argues, that “in 1950, Eugen Klein had the legal recourse to an appeal against the nationalization of the house. The fact that he did not appeal or he lost the appeal is it not, we wonder, an acknowledgment that he understood that the nationalization of his house was just?” This argument, injurious to all the victims of the Stalinist era, and endorsed by PwC Romania was accepted in Court and the Judge Romulus Procks (a tenant in a nationalized house, himself) rules that the nationalization act was legal.

We appealed this ruling immediately and after more feet dragging by Mr. Scrieciu (PwC Romania’s legal representative) in January 2001, the Law 10/2001 is promulgated. This law admits the illegality of the nationalization and outlines the procedure for reparations. It is a law that contains flaws and ambiguities and barely complies with the European Community’s guidelines; however it maintains intact the populist image of the current Socialist government by “taking care” of the rights of the tenants in the nationalized houses.

Read on… respect for the law?

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