Newscasts at DW

Romanian Revolution, 20 years on
Revolution Files Script, Nov 2009, By ANCA PADURARU for Deutsche Welle English Service
Cue material: In December it will have been 20 years since thousands of Romanians shed their blood to overthrow the communist regime under Nicolae Ceausescu. But two decades later, most of the victims of that regime are still waiting for justice. Some 1,100 people died and 3,300 were injured over a period of three weeks, all over Romania, starting in mid-December 1989.Yet over one hundred people identified during the criminal investigations as those who either shot innocent people or ordered their deaths are still at large and hold high positions in society. From Bucharest, Anca Paduraru reports.
Spk: There was a brief window of opportunity, starting at the end of 2004, when 245 former military and civilian leaders were indicted and charged in court for their crimes 20 years ago. But that window closed this spring when President Traian Basescu fired the man who had been primarily responsible for carrying out that job: military prosecutor Dan Voinea. His team of criminal investigators and policemen was dismantled and the one thousand volumes of evidence they had collected was split up, with part of it being sent to civil prosecutors and the rest remaining with the military prosecutors. [...]

Pensions Story Script, 11 Sep 2003, By ANCA PADURARU for Deutsche Welle English Service
Spkr. In Western Europe people are demonstrating and striking against various government plans to reform their pension systems. In Romania, too, there are protests, overwhelmingly silent ones. Here it’s pensioners rather than working people who are involved. They queue, sometimes for hours, to get a waver for the radio and television license fee out from their electricity bills. The sum of what they save amounts to just over one US dollar, but for most of the more than six million pensioners in Romania this is a fortune worth saving. Teodora Nicolescu, an 85 year old former French teacher has just finished queuing at an electricty company office in Bucharest. Leaning on her walking stick, she talks of her plight. 
Teodora Nicolescu Voice Over: “Yes, I asked for a tax waver because I am a war veteran and I could not afford to pay it. After 22 years of teaching I have a 2.2 million lei pension (NOTE roughly USD 70). [...]   

Corruption Story Script, 9 Jun 2003, By ANCA PADURARU for Deutsche Welle English Service
Spk: Transparency International, a global alliance of non-governmental organizations, has surveyed the business leaders in an effort to find the solution to corruption. On a scale from zero to 10, with ten being highly clean, Romania’s scores have fallen steadily. Since 1997 it fell from over 3 to 2.6 last year. The score means that the business people operating in Romania are not convinced by the Government's anti-corruption policies. Thus Romania ranks closer to former Soviet Republics, and not to EU candidate countries. Still, the head of the German business people operating in Romania says the birds-eye-view is deceptive, and a look from up-close will do Romania more justice. Dirk Ruetze, general director of the Romanian-German Chamber of Commerce: Band #1 Dirk Ruetze: I have the impression that Romania is much better than the people in Germany think it is. The bad image that Romania has from former days is still in the stomach of the people. [...]

Rap Music Story Script, 17 Nov 2002, By ANCA PADURARU for Deutsche Welle English Service
Text over rap tune.
Spk. as voice-over Band #1: This rap song has taken the Romanian pop charts by storm. It's by a long established group called B.U.G. Mafia. The lyrics reflect the hopelessness and alienation that many young Romanians feel in the post-communist era. Over the past decade, the gap between the haves and have-nots has widened. As a result, many youngsters have turned to crime and many have also embraced music that they feel speaks to them:
Spk. as voice-over Band #1: “Take this advice from us,” BUG Mafia raps, and the female soloist echoes: “Look well around you. You might understand something. Take care what you’re doing, and who you get together with. And see how you can make it so that you come out on top.” MUSIC up again Spk.: The three-member B.U.G. Mafia group have certainly made it to the top in Romania, and like other rap artists around the world, music was their ticket out of a life of crime.[...]   

IT Story Script, 17 Nov 2002, By ANCA PADURARU for Deutsche Welle English Service
Cue material: Corruption seemed to be the one major issue likely to keep Romania out of NATO, prior to the November Summit in Prague deciding on the North Atlantic Alliance future expansion. This is why the Executive in the Eastern European country committed itself to deal with corruption head-on. In doing so, Romania got a policy specifically targeting corruption. But the most notable accomplishment in the field came with help from an unlikely source: the IT industry.
Spk: Officials in the IT & Communication Ministry of Romania pride themselves with having introduced policies which make this one of the few nations to have adopted e-government and e-procurement. It’s an attempt to streamline bureaucracy and curb corruption. Romania is the sixth nation in the world so far to have adopted e-procurement. Just a few months since it was first introduced, the on-line bidding system for public companies and government agencies has resulted in major savings to the budget.[...]

Floods Story Script, 27 Aug 2002, By ANCA PADURARU for Deutsche Welle English Service
Spk: The Romanian Executive issued an analysis late last week showing local authorities were to blame for much of the damage incurred to private and public property. The central government says local authorities allowed houses to be built on the flood plains. They did not keep clean sewage and flash-floods draining systems; did not have in place rapid intervention teams and warning systems; and did not maintain in good condition roads, river banks, and bridges. At the same time, private individuals were blamed too because forests were cut down from hill slopes by their owners, and many houses were built without proper foundations. During over one month of rain and storms, three quarters of Romania’s counties were hit by flash-floods, and 22 lives were lost. Elsewhere in Europe, major rivers did much of the flooding, but in Romania the pattern was different. Small rivulets or dry river beds carried huge amounts of water gushing down the slopes and taking downhill everything in their path.[...]