Should we pay for others' investments?

We don’t care, the state must get out money back! We lost, we were robbed and someone must pay. This is what the FNI investors are asking for.

No one likes to lose, and when this happens, especially when it’s about money, the first thing on your mind is that someone must return it, that someone is to blame for what happened. One’s decision is assumed much more rarely when there is a loss. It is rather assumed in a gain.

What is happening at the FNI, with the people, mostly aged, standing daily in the street, occupying streets and official buildings in the attempt to recover the money they lost in this mutual fund, is undoubtedly dramatic. Life has become harsh for several hundred thousand investors. As we can see on television, the same faces have been flickering during every financial crisis on banks’ doorsteps, asking for their money back.

In spite of what is happening – with all the understanding for those who lost – a question must be asked. Why should the state pay? Why?

The state represents the populace. This is where the money comes from to keep all the state institutions, and the people leading them, going. Now, why should the people pay so others can get back the money they put into a private venture? Regardless of who are the shareholders and what ensigns were used to attract the money, the FNI was a private venture. Had they won, none of the FNI investors would be willing to share their winnings with anyone. So why would anyone cover their losses, even indirectly through the state, because directly no one will pay a dime?

What is dangerous in the FNI scandal is how things are seen by one of the people who established the Fund, led it for a while and now, paradoxically, is again leading the FNI, as the manager.

To settle things down, so investors can get their money, the state, the government, CEC, someone must give the money. A trillion lei, two trillion, three trillion… and up. It doesn’t matter that the fund was found in a total mess, no one knows how many investors there are, how many certificates of deposit are in circulation, because false reports were issued, and there could have been fraud. The state must come up with the money. That is, the others, who haven’t lost. And everything was said, during the Senate hearings, without anyone even blinking and asking why.

It is remarkable how much interest MPs have in this case, in “finding the truth.” But this interest is seen only as a means for more publicity. To show that someone – the Senators – cares about the fate of those who lost at the FNI. But let’s keep things straight. Why should the government pay the money back – this could be a question for the ApR, a party that demands the Government to assume responsibility in the FNI affair. Certainly, the Government and Parliament have a share of responsibility, since the state’s institutions are involved – CEC and CNVM. But responsibility must be criminal, civic, moral and not material, because the money, if the reparations are made, will come from the people who haven’t lost, because the state has no money of its own.

It is the duty of the Government, of the Prime Minister, minister of Interior, Prosecutor’s Office, Justice, and Parliament to untangle this affair, to look for the missing money, to sequester the goods of those who ran SOV Invest, CEC, FNI. It is the government’s duty to recoup the money and bring those responsible to justice. This is what should happen. Because they are the only ones with this kind of power. Not with this kind of money. They just give the money they take from other people, whom they don’t even ask. If we, the taxpaying citizens, were to be asked whether we want to pay for someone else who lost at the FNI, everyone would say no.