Romania: Charles, Prince of Wales and soon King of the Romanians?
Since his first visit to Transylvania in 1997, Elizabeth II's son has bought two properties there. He would have claimed to be descended from Prince Vlad Tepes, said Dracula. A good king for Romanians?
A King Charles of Romania? The possibility seems unrealistic, but why not? The solution may have certain attractions: that Romania should have as its king the son of the current Queen of the United Kingdom, Elisabeth II! This would result in an unprecedented twinning between Romania and the UK. Sounds like a sci-fi movie script, right? For this to become a reality, three conditions must be met. First of all, Prince Charles will become king in an Eastern country which has traditionally been very difficult. Secondly, that the Romanian political class really strongly wants it. And, finally, that the Romanian people want it.
The last condition would be the least difficult to satisfy. Romanians are still overwhelmingly anti-monarchists, but that could change. And whoever would tip public opinion would have to be a figure of imposing public stature. The Prince of Wales has such a stature, one that is lacking in the current royal line of Bucharest (King Michael, 90, is no longer a solution for the future). Furthermore, beyond being a staunch defender of the exceptional nature of Transylvania and the Carpathians, Prince Charles can be considered a successor to the dynasty that modernized Romania. He is the nephew of King Michael, his mother, Elisabeth II, being a third cousin of the former Romanian ruler.
Of course, for now we're embroidering on an imaginary story. But why shouldn't it become reality? Who can stop us from dreaming? In times of cruel disappointment, we need a burst of national energy. While the formulas of the last twenty-two years have failed, we would like a radical change, which does not slip into dictatorship, because we have spent enough years of the twentieth century under dictatorships of all kinds.
And, even if nothing changes, we will still have gained something compared to the 1990s: today we are talking about the hypothetical King Charles while at the time the ex-president Ion Iliescu offered us as an alternative King Cioaba, king of the Roma.
