Informative Notes…

Leontin Horaţiu Iuhas

Dear “sources,” more than a year has already passed since I offered you this column, giving you the opportunity to ask for forgiveness. Forgiveness from those whom you betrayed — even though they were your friends, neighbors, colleagues, or even relatives. But unfortunately, the column has remained empty…

So that the younger generation, which does not know what communism meant for Romanian society, will not believe it is merely an exaggeration that, out of twenty million Romanians, over one hundred thousand — perhaps even several hundred thousand — were informers for the Securitate, I will begin publishing some of their “informative notes.”

Today I will publish an informative note written by a Securitate informer who had been instructed to convince my mother that all the neighbors, the entire neighborhood, were against her and her actions. The note is also accompanied by the annotations of Major Gh. Herța — a Securitate officer who, one day, even beat my mother with fists and kicks, together with the militiaman stationed at her gate.

• Source: “Grama Mihai”
• Mr. Herța Gh.
• 28.09.1989

INFORMATIVE NOTE

On Wednesday, 28 July of this year, around 1:00 p.m., I happened to meet Professor Doina Cornea on Calea Turzii Street, near building no. 66, with whom I had the following conversation.

• Are you Professor Doina Cornea?
• Yes, sir, I was answered.
• I am an ordinary citizen of this neighborhood, and for a long time I have wanted to express my indignation at the lies you write to Radio Free Europe about socialist Romania.
• Sir, please leave me alone, and if you do not like what I do, report me to the court.
• Madam, the court is us, the Romanian people, who for 45 years have raised Romania to unimaginable heights, and we, the many, condemn your hostile and traitorous attitude.
• Sir, I see you have learned your lesson well and were probably sent by the Securitate to frighten me. I receive many threats and encouragements, but I am not afraid.
• I replied that I am neither a member of the Communist Party, nor has anyone urged me to do this, but only my conscience as a patriot has led me to express my indignation. Moreover, the majority of citizens in the neighborhood condemn your attitude, and in their name we tell you to stop denigrating our country and writing false reports to Radio Free Europe.

Then she entered the bread shop and the grocery store. I left the place of the discussion because the interlocutor stood in line in the shop.

GRAMA MIHAI

The source acted according to the instructions received, to respond to the hostile actions of “DIANA.”

He will repeat the intervention at our indication.

Mr. Herța Gh.

Dear “sources” — mine or those of the other several million Romanians — I believe it is very difficult for you, especially when you meet the “targets” about whom you provided information. It would be so simple, and you too would free yourselves: you would only need to take us aside and, face to face, confess and perhaps, if you feel so, ask for forgiveness. Otherwise, every time you meet, you will be tormented by the thought… “does he know?… does he not know?…”

In any case, your written commitments are and will remain forever in the archives of the CNSAS, which can be consulted by anyone who wishes (a person who had a surveillance file, a journalist, a researcher, etc.).

In order to help you confess and free yourselves, I have inaugurated the column “I Was an Informer.”

You can do it publicly here. This column will be available to you month after month. I hope it will not remain empty!

There have been public figures who, in the 1990s, openly acknowledged their status as former Securitate informers and asked for forgiveness. And they were forgiven!