Vasile Luca

Vasile Luca

Vasile Luca (birth name: László Luka ; born June 8, 1898 in Catalina , Covasna district ; † July 27, 1963 in the prison of Aiud , Alba district ) was a Romanian politician of the Romanian Communist Party PCR (Partidul Comunist din România) or since 1948 the PMR (Partidul Muncitoresc Român) , who was among other things a member of the Politburo and the Secretariat of the Central Committee of the party between 1945 and 1952 . He was also Minister of Finance from 1947 to 1952 and Vice Prime Minister between 1949 and 1952.

Within the Communist Party, along with Ana Pauker, he was one of the leading figures in the group of so-called “emigrants” who had spent the Second World War in exile in Moscow . The so-called "locals", of whom Gheorghe Gheorghiu-Dej was the most important, had been imprisoned in Romanian prisons during the war. A somewhat less Stalinist group, to which Lucrețiu Pătrăşcanu belonged, had saved itself through the years of Ion Antonescu's military dictatorship by hiding in Romania.

He was excluded from the PMR in 1952 together with the group around Ana Pauker, Teohari Georgescu and Gheorghe Rădulescu .

Life

Locksmith, First World War and party official

Luca, who belongs to the Magyar minority in Romania and was born as László Luka, completed an apprenticeship as a locksmith at the state railway company CFR ( Căile Ferate Române ) after attending primary school and then worked as a locksmith in their railway depot in Kronstadt . During the First World War in 1915 he was drafted into the joint army of Austria-Hungary and took part in several front-line missions.

After the end of the war, he joined the National Guard (Garda Națională) as a volunteer and belonged to the Szekler Association (Divizia secuiască) , which consists of members of the Magyar minority , before resuming his professional activity as a locksmith in the railway depot of Brașov in 1919. During this time he also became a member of the union and the PCR and began working as a party official in the mid-1920s when he became secretary of the party committee in Brașov County in 1924 . A short time later, however, after the PCR was banned in 1924, he was arrested for his political activities and was imprisoned until 1927.

In 1930 Luca took part in the factionalist activities within the illegal party and was entrusted with the organization of the party work in what is now Moldova . In 1933 he was arrested again for his involvement in trade union activities and sentenced to five years in prison, which he served until 1938. After his release from prison in 1938 he became a member of the Central Committee of the PCR.

Escape to the Soviet Union, World War II and return to Romania

Conference of the Romanian Communist Party in 1945.
From left to right: Vasile Luca, Constantin Pîrvulescu , Lucrețiu Pătrăşcanu , Ana Pauker , Teohari Georgescu , Florica Bagdasar and Gheorghe Vasilichi

On April 4, 1940, Luca was arrested again while trying to cross the border into the Soviet Union and sentenced to eight months in prison in Cernăuăi prison. However, after the city was conquered by the Red Army , he was released from prison on June 28, 1940 and acquired Soviet citizenship.

During the Second World War he stayed in the Soviet Union and worked there for the Romanian department of Radio Moscow and the Romanian radio stations supported by the Communist International . At the same time he was active in the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU), which he served as a deputy in the Supreme Soviet of the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic from 1940 to September 1944 .

Luca returned to Romania in September 1944. Within the Communist Party, he was, along with Ana Pauker, one of the leading figures in the group of so-called “emigrants” who had spent the Second World War in exile in Moscow. The so-called "locals", of whom Gheorghe Gheorghiu-Dej was the most important, had been imprisoned in Romanian prisons during the war. A somewhat less Stalinist group, to which Lucrețiu Pătrăşcanu belonged, had saved itself through the Antonescu years by hiding in Romania.

Politburo member, Central Committee secretary, finance minister and vice-prime minister

At the National Conference of the PCR (Conferința Națională) , which took place from October 16 to 22, 1945, Luca was elected a member of the PCR Central Committee, the Politburo of the Central Committee and the Secretariat of the Central Committee of the PCR and belonged to these bodies until he was disempowered on May 27, 1952. From 1946 to 1948 he was a member of the Chamber of Deputies (Adunarea Deputaților) and represented the constituency of Cluj during this time . In addition, he was accepted on November 1, 1947 as a brigadier general in the service of the armed forces ( Armata Română ) .

In 1947, Luca was awarded the Grand Cross of the Order of the Crown of Romania (Coroana României) for his services .

On November 1, 1947, he also took over the office of Minister of Finance (Ministru al Finanțelor) in the government of Prime Minister Petru Groza and held this ministerial office until March 9, 1952. At the same time, he was President of the Commission for Simplification from December 1, 1948 and rationalization of the state apparatus. In 1948 he became a member of the Grand National Assembly (Marea Adunare Națională) for the first time , where he represented the constituency of Cluj until 1952 and for a short time the constituency of Aleşd until he lost power on May 27, 1952 .

He was also Vice President of the Council of Ministers from April 16, 1949 to May 28, 1952, and from May 24, 1950 to May 27, 1952, also a member of the organization office of the Central Committee of the PMR.

Disempowered in 1952, sentenced and rehabilitated in 1968

The then First Secretary of the PMR, Gheorghe Gheorghiu-Dej , accused him in 1952 of deviating from the party line, which led to Lucas' disempowerment

At the plenum of the Central Committee of the PMR on May 27, 1952 , he lost his political offices after he was accused of a “right deviation” ('deviere de dreapta') . He was expelled from the PMR in 1952 along with the allegedly anti-party group around Ana Pauker, Teohari Georgescu and Gheorghe Rădulescu. After the disempowerment, the then First Secretary of the Central Committee of the PMR, Gheorghe Gheorghiu-Dej, accused both Pauker and himself of having “instigated provocative measures” and “trampled on the free will of the farmers” in the collectivization of agriculture in Romania .

On the other hand, the disempowerment of the anti-party group Gheorghiu-Dej in 1952 led to the termination of the so-called Pitești experiment , a re-education measure initiated by parts of the Securitate secret service in the years 1949 to 1952, in which attempts were made to transform political prisoners into communist-oriented people.

Luca was finally arrested on August 14, 1952 and was in custody until autumn 1954. In 1954 a court sentenced him to death for attempting anti-working-class activities and for undermining the national economy . The death sentence was soon commuted to life-long forced labor . This punishment he served until his death on 27 July 1963 at the Penitentiary of Aiud.

At a plenum of the Central Committee of the PCR in April 1968, he was legally rehabilitated posthumously by Gheorghiu-Dej's successor Nicolae Ceauşescu .

literature

• Biography. (PDF) In: Consiliul Național pentru Studiera Arhivelor Securității. Membrii CC al PCR 1945-1989. Dicționar , p. 365

Web links

Commons : Vasile Luca  - collection of images, videos and audio files