These days the killing (named pretentiously, euthanasia) of the stray dogs is breaking news, a hot news item. Following this subject, I read that three companies won the auction to catch the poor animals. I think it is very cynical to hold an auction to decide who will send animals to die, but, taking into account the law, I understand that the local authorities respected the legal framework or, at least in this situation, they gave the illusion of respecting it. What is, however, almost impossible to understand from my perspective is the stated activity of those companies.

As I read in newspapers, one is specialized in consultancy and management and the two others in terrestrial transport. I know that by law any company can have one main activity and a few other activities, but I think it is a huge gap between consultancy and management, transport and the gathering of the stray dogs. It isn’t my intention to contest the auction because I don’t have the complete information but this selection is, at least, weird. I also read that these companies stand to make around 3 million euros from this activity.

But who will really pocket this money? And why do local authorities now need to raise this money? Where's what we paid as local taxes? And then I cannot help but wonder if the stray dog euthanasia will move to the next step, what will happen with the dead dogs? You could see this as a cynical question, but it is a legit one: will their furs and skins be used for anything, and who will make money out of this?

And there are many more questions, but I find everything that happens these days quite ironic, considering the everlasting economic, financial and social problems of Romania.

Have our politicians and authorities found one miraculous solution that brings money to budget? If we gather and kill all the stray dogs, then, the next activity could be catching and killing stray cats, mice, and so on. We could go on, down the funny slope, but after we sold our banks, companies and lands in deals more or less profitable from the Romanian state's perspective, now we’re appealing to such methods to make more money, by using the killing …it is terrible.

Anyway, if a consultancy management company is in charge of such types of activities, maybe Romanians have discovered a new “science”, named “the professional management of gathering stray dogs” or, if you prefer, “how to catch a stray dog based on scientific methods”. So, we can sell the patent to others, make some good money and improve our international reputation as Dracula’s land!

Jokes aside and concluding, the so called ruling class in Romania aren’t able to work in ways that makes sense economically, in order to solve the financial problems generated by their lack of professionalism and global professional vision. They cannot find solutions and put into practice measures for solving huge social problems such as abandoned children, young people without any future prospects, the higher number of depressed mature people, poor and disregarded senior people and unemployment. But they’ve found a new way to distract attention, speculating a tragic event and above all instigating yet again Romanians against Romanians. It is sad and brings to my mind an expression to characterize Romania: “Beautiful country, pity it is inhabited”.

In my opinion, what is dramatic in reality is Romania’s people are essentially good. We are a nation who knows and respects the value of life but sadly again, many people are so naive that they can be easily manipulated. Maybe the lack of political education has turned many Romanians this way. And all of us, by voting, brought in our life this abomination that is called the Romanian political class.

By the way, what is the score between the stray dog problem and the Rosia Montana gold mining problem? Just wondering: Have the politicians succeeded to distract attention from one problem to another?

By Mariana Ganea, guest writer