George Simion, the sharp-tongued, sharp-suited leader of Romania’s nationalists, picks his words with care — or at least these days he does. In just a few years, the one-time football hooligan has moved from the margins of the far right to become a serious contender for power. His “Romania-first” party is at 37 per cent in the opinion polls — higher than any of Europe’s other nationalist populist parties.
In the spirit of Maga’s ultimate impresario, Donald Trump, Simion is known for his incendiary language. In last year’s presidential election campaign, he called his socially awkward opponent, Nicușor Dan, “autistic”. (Dan went on to win.) But now the social media street-fighter plays statesman-in-waiting. Berating his bugbear, the EU, he adopts a sombre, plaintive tone as he holds forth in his vast office in Bucharest. Only occasionally does he let rip. At one point, he can’t help himself: his goal, he says, is to stop the EU from becoming “a Soviet Union”.
At Simion’s side is a silver-haired sociology professor, Dan Dungaciu, who joined his inner circle last year as a foreign affairs adviser, presumably to add gravitas to Simion’s pugnacious image. A camera crew starts filming as Simion sets out his nationalist stall: Romania needs to stand up for itself in an uncertain world. “We are the sixth-largest country in the European Union and we don’t have a voice,” he says.