Alexandru Iacob (communist)
Encyclopedia
Alexandru Iacob was an Austro-Hungarian
-born Romania
n and Hungarian
communist
politician and economist, who served as Deputy to Vasile Luca
within the Romanian Ministry of Finance
, and eventually became a victim of repression in Communist Romania
. A member of the Romanian Communist Party
(PCR) before and after World War II
, he was also clandestinely active within the Hungarian Communist Party
(KMP) in Northern Transylvania
between 1940 and 1944. In 1952, after having served in the Petru Groza
cabinet, he and Luca were accused of "right-wing deviation
", stripped of their positions, and incarcerated. Iacob survived confinement, was released in the 1960s, and eventually left Romania for Sweden
.
, five years before the area's union with Romania
, into a family of Hungarian Jews
. His father died before World War II; his mother fell victim to the Holocaust, being killed at Auschwitz after the 1944 deportations.
Alexandru Iacob became a member of the underground PCR in the early 1930s, but, after the Second Vienna Award
assigned Northern Transylvania to Hungary, joined the KMP, becoming its Secretary for the region. He was in hiding during the entire period from June 1941, when Hungary joined the war on the Eastern Front
, until the arrival of the Soviet
Red Army
in September 1944. While in hiding, he recruited some new party members and followers, compensating for the wave of arrests carried out by the Hungarian Regency
authorities among communist militants. He also organized the distribution of anti-war
leaflets.
After 1944, when Northern Transylvania was effectively reintegrated into Romania, Iacob was again a PCR member and one of its Cluj
-based Regional Committee members. He married Magda Farkas, daughter of a prominent Jewish businessman from Cluj who had escaped the Holocaust by hiding in a nearby village. In 1947, he was moved to Bucharest
, where he joined the staff of Vasile Luca
, Minister of Finance, PCR Secretary and vice-Premier
in the Petru Groza cabinet. In 1948, soon after the establishment of a Romanian communist regime
, Iacob became Deputy Minister of Finance and acted in that capacity until the spring of 1952, when he was arrested as part of the campaign against the so-called "right-wing deviation". At the trial of Luca and his group, he did not admit to willful wrongdoing (the accusation against him was sabotage
). He was sentenced to 20 years in prison and spent 12 years in solitary confinement.
He was freed as part of the general amnesty of 1964, decreed by communist leader Gheorghe Gheorghiu-Dej
before his death. Iacob's wife had also been arrested in the summer of 1952. She was released in 1954, insane. The defendants of the Luca trial—Luca, Iacob, Ivan Solymos and Dumitru Cernicica
were officially rehabilitated
in 1968, during the liberalization
phase associated with the early years of the Nicolae Ceauşescu
regime. Luca and Solymos had died in jail.
Following his release from prison, Alexandru Iacob worked as an economist. In the late sixties he remarried and some time in the 1980s he and his wife were allowed to emigrate to Sweden, where they were well received. He was very nicely treated as a former victim of a totalitarian
regime. He died in Stockholm
in 1997.
Austria-Hungary
Austria-Hungary , more formally known as the Kingdoms and Lands Represented in the Imperial Council and the Lands of the Holy Hungarian Crown of Saint Stephen, was a constitutional monarchic union between the crowns of the Austrian Empire and the Kingdom of Hungary in...
-born Romania
Romania
Romania is a country located at the crossroads of Central and Southeastern Europe, on the Lower Danube, within and outside the Carpathian arch, bordering on the Black Sea...
n and Hungarian
Hungary
Hungary , officially the Republic of Hungary , is a landlocked country in Central Europe. It is situated in the Carpathian Basin and is bordered by Slovakia to the north, Ukraine and Romania to the east, Serbia and Croatia to the south, Slovenia to the southwest and Austria to the west. The...
communist
Communism
Communism is a social, political and economic ideology that aims at the establishment of a classless, moneyless, revolutionary and stateless socialist society structured upon common ownership of the means of production...
politician and economist, who served as Deputy to Vasile Luca
Vasile Luca
Vasile Luca was an Austro-Hungarian-born Romanian and Soviet communist politician, a leading member of the Romanian Communist Party from 1945 and until his imprisonment in the 1950s...
within the Romanian Ministry of Finance
Ministry of Public Finance (Romania)
The Ministry of Public Finance of Romania is one of the fifteen ministries of the Government of Romania.The minister's seat is currently held by the Democratic Liberal Party's Gheorghe Ialomiţeanu.The following agencies are subordinated to the Minister:...
, and eventually became a victim of repression in Communist Romania
Communist Romania
Communist Romania was the period in Romanian history when that country was a Soviet-aligned communist state in the Eastern Bloc, with the dominant role of Romanian Communist Party enshrined in its successive constitutions...
. A member of the Romanian Communist Party
Romanian Communist Party
The Romanian Communist Party was a communist political party in Romania. Successor to the Bolshevik wing of the Socialist Party of Romania, it gave ideological endorsement to communist revolution and the disestablishment of Greater Romania. The PCR was a minor and illegal grouping for much of the...
(PCR) before and after World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
, he was also clandestinely active within the Hungarian Communist Party
Hungarian Communist Party
The Communist Party of Hungary , renamed Hungarian Communist Party in 1945, was founded on November 24, 1918, and was in power in Hungary briefly from March to August 1919 under Béla Kun and the Hungarian Soviet Republic. The communist government was overthrown by the Romanian Army and driven...
(KMP) in Northern Transylvania
Northern Transylvania
Northern Transylvania is a region of Transylvania, situated within the territory of Romania. The population is largely composed of both ethnic Romanians and Hungarians, and the region has been part of Romania since 1918 . During World War II, as a consequence of the territorial agreement known as...
between 1940 and 1944. In 1952, after having served in the Petru Groza
Petru Groza
Petru Groza was a Romanian politician, best known as the Prime Minister of the first Communist Party-dominated governments under Soviet occupation during the early stages of the Communist regime in Romania....
cabinet, he and Luca were accused of "right-wing deviation
Right Opposition
The Right Opposition was the name given to the tendency made up of Nikolai Bukharin, Alexei Rykov, Mikhail Tomsky and their supporters within the Soviet Union in the late 1920s...
", stripped of their positions, and incarcerated. Iacob survived confinement, was released in the 1960s, and eventually left Romania for Sweden
Sweden
Sweden , officially the Kingdom of Sweden , is a Nordic country on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe. Sweden borders with Norway and Finland and is connected to Denmark by a bridge-tunnel across the Öresund....
.
Biography
Iacob was born in the region of TransylvaniaTransylvania
Transylvania is a historical region in the central part of Romania. Bounded on the east and south by the Carpathian mountain range, historical Transylvania extended in the west to the Apuseni Mountains; however, the term sometimes encompasses not only Transylvania proper, but also the historical...
, five years before the area's union with Romania
Union of Transylvania with Romania
Union of Transylvania with Romania was declared on by the assembly of the delegates of ethnic Romanians held in Alba Iulia.The national holiday of Romania, the Great Union Day occurring on December 1, commemorates this event...
, into a family of Hungarian Jews
History of the Jews in Hungary
Hungarian Jews have existed since at least the 11th century. After struggling against discrimination throughout the Middle Ages, by the early 20th century the community grew to be 5% of Hungary's population , and were prominent in science, the arts and business...
. His father died before World War II; his mother fell victim to the Holocaust, being killed at Auschwitz after the 1944 deportations.
Alexandru Iacob became a member of the underground PCR in the early 1930s, but, after the Second Vienna Award
Second Vienna Award
The Second Vienna Award was the second of two Vienna Awards arbitrated by the Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy. Rendered on August 30, 1940, it re-assigned the territory of Northern Transylvania from Romania to Hungary.-Prelude and historical background :After the World War I, the multi-ethnic...
assigned Northern Transylvania to Hungary, joined the KMP, becoming its Secretary for the region. He was in hiding during the entire period from June 1941, when Hungary joined the war on the Eastern Front
Eastern Front (World War II)
The Eastern Front of World War II was a theatre of World War II between the European Axis powers and co-belligerent Finland against the Soviet Union, Poland, and some other Allies which encompassed Northern, Southern and Eastern Europe from 22 June 1941 to 9 May 1945...
, until the arrival of the Soviet
Soviet Union
The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....
Red Army
Red Army
The Workers' and Peasants' Red Army started out as the Soviet Union's revolutionary communist combat groups during the Russian Civil War of 1918-1922. It grew into the national army of the Soviet Union. By the 1930s the Red Army was among the largest armies in history.The "Red Army" name refers to...
in September 1944. While in hiding, he recruited some new party members and followers, compensating for the wave of arrests carried out by the Hungarian Regency
Kingdom of Hungary (1920–1946)
The Kingdom of Hungary also known as the Regency, existed from 1920 to 1946 and was a de facto country under Regent Miklós Horthy. Horthy officially represented the abdicated Hungarian monarchy of Charles IV, Apostolic King of Hungary...
authorities among communist militants. He also organized the distribution of anti-war
Anti-war
An anti-war movement is a social movement, usually in opposition to a particular nation's decision to start or carry on an armed conflict, unconditional of a maybe-existing just cause. The term can also refer to pacifism, which is the opposition to all use of military force during conflicts. Many...
leaflets.
After 1944, when Northern Transylvania was effectively reintegrated into Romania, Iacob was again a PCR member and one of its Cluj
Cluj-Napoca
Cluj-Napoca , commonly known as Cluj, is the fourth most populous city in Romania and the seat of Cluj County in the northwestern part of the country. Geographically, it is roughly equidistant from Bucharest , Budapest and Belgrade...
-based Regional Committee members. He married Magda Farkas, daughter of a prominent Jewish businessman from Cluj who had escaped the Holocaust by hiding in a nearby village. In 1947, he was moved to Bucharest
Bucharest
Bucharest is the capital municipality, cultural, industrial, and financial centre of Romania. It is the largest city in Romania, located in the southeast of the country, at , and lies on the banks of the Dâmbovița River....
, where he joined the staff of Vasile Luca
Vasile Luca
Vasile Luca was an Austro-Hungarian-born Romanian and Soviet communist politician, a leading member of the Romanian Communist Party from 1945 and until his imprisonment in the 1950s...
, Minister of Finance, PCR Secretary and vice-Premier
Prime Minister of Romania
The Prime Minister of Romania is the head of the Government of Romania. Initially, the office was styled President of the Council of Ministers , when the term "Government" included more than the Cabinet, and the Cabinet was called The Council of Ministers...
in the Petru Groza cabinet. In 1948, soon after the establishment of a Romanian communist regime
Communist Romania
Communist Romania was the period in Romanian history when that country was a Soviet-aligned communist state in the Eastern Bloc, with the dominant role of Romanian Communist Party enshrined in its successive constitutions...
, Iacob became Deputy Minister of Finance and acted in that capacity until the spring of 1952, when he was arrested as part of the campaign against the so-called "right-wing deviation". At the trial of Luca and his group, he did not admit to willful wrongdoing (the accusation against him was sabotage
Sabotage
Sabotage is a deliberate action aimed at weakening another entity through subversion, obstruction, disruption, or destruction. In a workplace setting, sabotage is the conscious withdrawal of efficiency generally directed at causing some change in workplace conditions. One who engages in sabotage is...
). He was sentenced to 20 years in prison and spent 12 years in solitary confinement.
He was freed as part of the general amnesty of 1964, decreed by communist leader Gheorghe Gheorghiu-Dej
Gheorghe Gheorghiu-Dej
Gheorghe Gheorghiu-Dej was the Communist leader of Romania from 1948 until his death in 1965.-Early life:Gheorghe was the son of a poor worker, Tănase Gheorghiu, and his wife Ana. Gheorghiu-Dej joined the Communist Party of Romania in 1930...
before his death. Iacob's wife had also been arrested in the summer of 1952. She was released in 1954, insane. The defendants of the Luca trial—Luca, Iacob, Ivan Solymos and Dumitru Cernicica
Dumitru Cernicica
Dumitru Cernicica was an Austro-Hungarian-born Romanian and Hungarian communist politician and engineer, who served in various economic-financial positions in the Romanian Communist government...
were officially rehabilitated
Rehabilitation (Soviet)
Rehabilitation in the context of the former Soviet Union, and the Post-Soviet states, was the restoration of a person who was criminally prosecuted without due basis, to the state of acquittal...
in 1968, during the liberalization
Liberalization
In general, liberalization refers to a relaxation of previous government restrictions, usually in areas of social or economic policy. In some contexts this process or concept is often, but not always, referred to as deregulation...
phase associated with the early years of the Nicolae Ceauşescu
Nicolae Ceausescu
Nicolae Ceaușescu was a Romanian Communist politician. He was General Secretary of the Romanian Communist Party from 1965 to 1989, and as such was the country's second and last Communist leader...
regime. Luca and Solymos had died in jail.
Following his release from prison, Alexandru Iacob worked as an economist. In the late sixties he remarried and some time in the 1980s he and his wife were allowed to emigrate to Sweden, where they were well received. He was very nicely treated as a former victim of a totalitarian
Totalitarianism
Totalitarianism is a political system where the state recognizes no limits to its authority and strives to regulate every aspect of public and private life wherever feasible...
regime. He died in Stockholm
Stockholm
Stockholm is the capital and the largest city of Sweden and constitutes the most populated urban area in Scandinavia. Stockholm is the most populous city in Sweden, with a population of 851,155 in the municipality , 1.37 million in the urban area , and around 2.1 million in the metropolitan area...
in 1997.