Maria Ion, age 38, a widow and mother of five, was buried today
in Bucharest, killed in Friday night's fire at Club Colectiv where
she worked occasionally as a cleaning lady.
Two of Maria Ion's children, 15-year-old Denise and 11-year-old Alexandra,
posed next to her coffin after they had requested a souvenir picture with
their mother inside the family home they had shared in Bucharest.
Nearly 20,000 citizens assembled tonight in downtown Bucharest to
demand the resignations of Prime Minister Victor Ponta, Interior
Minister Gabriel Opera, and the Mayor of the District in Bucharest
where Club Colectiv was located.
The Romanian Orthodox Christian Church also was criticized for failing to address the
national outpouring of grief after Friday's nightclub fire, as four days
had elapsed before the first priests went to the disaster site to say
prayers and light candles. But Patriarch Daniel, who heads the
Church, said the church is being picked on: "There is always hostility
toward the church, which is very hard to understand," he reportedly
remarked.
Romania's President Klaus Iohannis had visited the site on the day
after the fire and had laid a wreath. Prime Minister Victor Ponta announced that Romania will accept
aid from medical burn specialists at hospitals in other countries,
and he said that an emergency ordinance will be introduced in parliament
to empower fire marshals to close nightclubs or other businesses
which they deem to be operating unsafely.
Some 130 people remain hospitalized from their fire injuries, the
media in Romania reported today.
Prime Minister Victor Ponta, who had returned promptly from a meeting in Mexico,
announced that Romania will accept
aid from medical burn specialists at hospitals in other countries,
and that an emergency ordinance will be introduced in parliament
to empower fire marshals to close nightclubs or other businesses
which they deem to be operating unsafely.
Costin Mincu, one of the three coowners of Club Colectiv, waits in
handcuffs in a police car, arrested on charges of negligence and
manslaughter.
Interior Minister Gabriel Opera was already under fire from media
and citizens for an earlier tragedy in which a motorcycle policeman
who was leading Opera's motorcade fell to his death in an open
and unmarked street pavement excavation and Opera had failed
to stop, saying several days later that he had not been aware of
that officer's accident. The incident touched a public nerve when
the media disclosed that Opera had used a government-funded motorcade
on 1500 occasions this year.
A photo of the scene at tonight's anti-government street demonstration in Bucharest.
ALLAN CRUSE
03 NOV 2015