Niculina Moica

* 1943

  • "I stayed in Arad up until the events in Cuba. They transferred us one night - they got us out of the rooms, we gathered our belongings in a small bundle because that's all we had -, we got on some trucks.... This was the moment that marked me, leaving a permanent impression in me. We were guarded by police officers armed with machine guns that were pointing at us. We were being taken to the railway station in these trucks, to be boarded on those special coaches for detainees. I still can't get that picture out of my mind, how they guarded us in the night, as if we were some sort of criminals who had done horrible things. Most of them were poor, sick women, some of them with long sentences ahead..."

  • "Munthiu Nicolae. He was the source of the big problem. The truth is that we listened to Radio Free Europe at home. So we basically grew up without any kind of love for the communist regime. And this boy thought about us, young people, doing something, starting an activity. (It was a mixture of different circumstances, so I can't even recall all details. I can hardly wait to read my file and see what else I said or did and what else happened back then because 50 years have passed and I have meanwhile forgotten many things.) We met on several occasions and talked. We were young, I was 15-16 years old, he was about 18 or 19 years old. We had some talks which were against the regime, that's true. But we only expressed our intentions, we didn't actually do something about it. Nicolae Munthiu had also drafted a statute of an organization which he called the Union of the Free Youth."

  • "I think I stayed in Botoşani for about a year. I shed a lot of tears for my father, I was very upset. I remember having to endure a terrible hunger and a dreadful cold in Botoşani. I had a room with no windows at one point - a window with no glass, which they had covered with a blanket. I would wake up in the middle of the night feeling hungry, I ate and felt all alone. I had a room neighbor, we shared a... wall, he was suffering from tuberculosis and thus received more bread. People suffering from tuberculosis had a special treatment, they were given a bit more bread. The poor guy would sometimes leave some bread for me at the toilet. You can imagine how nervous and scared he must have felt doing this. We communicated through the wall, using the Morse code, of course. I don't know whether he's still alive."

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    Bucharest, 10.04.2008

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“The truth is that we listened to Radio Free Europe at home. So we basically grew up without any kind of love for the communist regime.”

Niculina Moica before her arrest (1959)
Niculina Moica before her arrest (1959)
photo: Arhiva foto a Memorialului Victimelor Comunismului si al Rezistentei - fond Niculina Moica

She was born on October 21, 1943, in Ploieşti, where her parents had taken refuge during Second World War, after running away from Reghin (Mureş County). In 1944-1945, Niculina Moica’s family moved back to Reghin, where her father managed to buy 5 hectares of arable land - for which he would later on, after the establishment of the communist regime, be accused of being a wealthy peasant (Romanian chiabur). In 1959, Niculina Moica, who was still a high school student, joined the anti-communist organization Union of the Free Youth, formed on the initiative of a high school colleague, Nicolae Munthiu, along with other fellow peers. The members of the group met on several occasions, talked badly about the regime and wrote a few compassion letters to families whose members had been arrested. In June 1959, several boys in the group stole a few weapons from the forest division in Valea Gurghiului. Following this incident, on June 15, 1959, all members of the organization were arrested. Niculina Moica was 15 years and a half. Shortly after her arrest, on July 13, 1959, her father, Petru Moica, was also arrested. Tried by the Cluj Military Court in a trial in which about 20 people were involved (most of them high school students), the members of the group received sentences between 10 in prison and 25 years of forced labor. Niculina Moica and her father were sentenced to 20 years of forced labor for „plot against the socialist order”. After their arrest, Domnica, Niculina Moica’s mother, was evacuated from the house and all her belonging were confiscated. After spending five years in prison, in Târgu Mureş, Jilava, Botoşani, Arad and Oradea, Niculina Moica was pardoned and released from prison on June 23, 1964. Immediately after her release, she barely managed to find a job because of her criminal record, working in a bakery, where she peeled potatoes for bread. She then managed to re-enroll to high school in a distance learning program, and worked in accounting after graduation until her retirement. Niculina Moica is now living in Bucharest and is an active member of the Association of Former Political Detainees.