After Bucharest mayor Gabriela Firea had accused the co-founders of “Daruieste Viata/ Give Life” NGO, Oana Gheorghiu and Carmen Uscatu (photo), who managed to raise tens of millions of euros from private donations to build a hospital for children suffering on cancer in Romania, that they are an interface for Vlad Voiculescu, PLUS’s candidate for the Bucharest City Hall, the two social activists announced they will sue Firea.
More precisely, Gabriela Firea claims she also has a contribution to this hospital for she had signed to give the plot of land for the hospital under construction, a land that would be worth EUR 1 million, according the general mayor of the Capital.
“As a mayor, I also have a contribution to building this hospital. This hospital is being built on the property of the Bucharest City Hall, on a valuable plot of land worth EUR 1 million,” Firea told a TV show on Digi 24.
As for the Daruieste Viata NGO, Firea said: “Who’s managing this NGO? Mr. Voiculescu, former Health minister in Ciolos Cabinet, a minister who opposed transplants in Romania, and (…) today, the two ladies are in the front, as an interface.”
In retort, the NGO co-founder have accused Firea of bringing children with cancer in this “political row”.
“It seems that Mrs Gabriela Firea has come to embody the Romanian state. It is shocking,” said the two co-founders, adding that the Capital mayor has no contribution to this hospital, because the resolution of the Local Council Firea had referred to is actually related to the demolition of some ruins on the plot of land where the hospital is being erected.
“If there is someone who took the fate of the children suffering of cancer to the politics is Gabriela Firea. I don’t think you’ve ever heard us using the project, the hospitals and these children with cancer in this political dispute. I don’t know why Mrs Firea says that Vlad Voiculescu is behind us. She will have to present some evidence in this respect, for these lies cannot go any further. I think it is time that the outgoing prime minister, who is in office until the new Government is voted to intervene and clarify on one hand, the filthy attack of the Health Ministry against he hospital project and, on the other hand, Gabriela Firea’s attack. Both are subordinated to the PM, first in the Government, the second in the party,” Oana Gheorghiu told Digi 24, announcing the NGO is preparing to hire a lawyer in order to sue Firea.
As for the accusations against the Health Ministry in this case, Gheorghiu explained that they had a meeting with the Health minister Sorina Pintea and the ministry refused to equip the Marie Curie Hospital’s new construction destined for the children with cancer with a radiotherapy device. “We asked the ministry from the start that the hospital to be included in the World Bank funding programme. We have never asked for money. We told the ministry: we are doing the building, we give it to the state, and you, the ministry should take care of equipping the hospital, for the radiotherapy devices are very expensive and Romania has the WB programme. We received no answer, we found out that the ministry does not want or cannot equip the hospital on the ground there are too fee children with cancer in Romania, if you can imagine such an answer.”
The entire row has started from a share mayor Gabriela Firea gave from her personal Facebooki account to a controversial post of fashion designer Dana Budeanu, allegedly close to the Bucharest mayor, where she mocked the initiative of the Daruieste Viata hospital. Asked why she shared the fashion designer’s post, Gabriela Firea replied: “Is it forbidden to like and share posts on Facebook?”.
Former Health minister, Vlad Voiculescu, running for the Bucharest mayor seat at the local elections due in June 2020, has also retorted in this case.
“Mrs Firea informs us that, no more no less, I am <patronizing> other initiatives that are disturbing her from the PR point of view. Neither Gabriela Firea, nor Dragnea, nor Dăncilă, nor others in the old politics, can imagine that such initiatives as #NoiFacemUnSpital, ca MagiCAMP, MagicHOME , MagicHELP -or HOSPICE Casa Sperantei are developed by the civil society for its own benefit, helping the ones whom the state had abandoned. The cannot imagine we are already millions in this country who don’t need any master anymore. We are not and we have never been servants,” Vlad Voiculescu posted on Facebook.