Early life and career Cijevschi was a native of
Zaim village,
Bender County, at the geographical center of
Bessarabia Governorate. In a 1918 record of all
Sfatul Țării members, his nationality was indicated as "
Moldavian"—a term used in that paper for all the
ethnic Romanian or Romanian-speaking delegates; military historian Anatol Munteanu refers to his family as being "Moldavian Romanian", noting that Vasile's ancestors were priests—of the
Russian Orthodox Church—who had amassed a sizable family fortune. His birth date was 17 October 1880, though some records suggest 1881. Cijevschi never graduated, preferring to enlist in the
Cadet Corps. In 1902, he completed training at a cavalry school in
Yelisavetgrad,
Kherson Governorate, and was dispatched for guard duty on the
Sea of Japan coastline (
Primorskaya Oblast), at
Vladivostok and
Khabarovsk. He was involved in the
Russo-Japanese War, when he also received academic training in
Oriental studies and prepared for a career in Russian diplomacy. Caught up in a series of losing battles, Cijevschi was badly injured, and moved back into
European Russia—advancing to battalion commander with the official rank of
Major, he was honorably discharged on 16 April 1911. He was again called to arms upon the outbreak of World War I in mid 1914, the year which also marked his graduation as a philologist from
Saint Petersburg State University. Cijevschi's turn to
Romanian nationalism was observed by fellow activist
Grigore Cazacliu, whom Cijevschi visited in
Iași, on the
Romanian Front, at some point in mid 1917. As Cazacliu notes: "he pledged his body and his soul to our cause, namely the action for setting free our Bessarabia." the resulting
National Moldavian Party elected him as one of the chief delegates. Shortly after the
October Revolution, Cijevschi helped establish the All-Russian Congress of Moldavian Soldiers, functioning as the first legislative and executive body of Bessarabian autonomists. He was elected President of that Congress, with
Ștefan Holban serving as his secretary. As noted by Cioflec, this event witnessed the "most impressive moment" in the development of Romanian nationalism in Bessarabia: Cijevschi's speeches in Romanian alternated with renditions of patriotic songs (including
Deșteaptă-te, române! and
Pe-al nostru steag e scris Unire), while the attending crowds waved variants of the
Romanian tricolor. Cijevschi also issued orders for applying the ethnic criterion in education, setting aside funds for the "
nationalization" of Bessarabian schools, and reprimanding the authorities of
Akerman County for resisting this trend.
In the 1918 union struggle Confronting the groups of radicalized soldiers, especially the
Esers and
Bolsheviks, Cijevschi also drafted the first plans for a regional parliament and a Bessarabian military. Both he and Holban signed their names to a Congress proclamation on self-determination, which became legal precedent in the Moldavian Democratic Republic. Following the
legislative election of 1917, Cijevschi became a representative of
Bender in the new regional assembly, called
Sfatul Țării; his mandate officially began on the opening day of 21 November 1917, and saw him mainly active on the Legal and Drafting Commissions. Within this legislature, he also presided upon an all-Romanian faction, the "Moldavian Bloc", which rivaled other ethnic community parties. On 23 November, the Republic appointed Cijevschi Commissar of the Bessarabian army, which was engaged in the effort to contain Bolshevik rebellion. The office had been created on his own suggestion. Upon taking over, he applied his own philosophy for recruitment: instead of creating an all-Romanian military structure, he gave a significant share to members of all ethnic communities. One late report by soldier
Dimitrie Bogos notes that Cijevschi's
aide-de-camp,
Vasile Țanțu, was in charge during November, when the Commissar was incapacitated by disease. The seriousness of the turmoil created by Russian deserters was underscored on 2 December, when
Sfatul established a Commission to Combat Anarchy. Its members were Cijevschi, Țanțu,
Vladimir Cristi, and
Valentin Prahnițchi. The undertrained republican army could not ultimately deal with the raids carried out by Russian deserters, and Cijevschi resigned his commission on 22 December; the position itself had been made redundant by the creation of a
Military Directorate. On 7 December, he was also integrated with the
Foreign Directorate as an undersecretary of state, and, later that month, visited the
Romanian Kingdom. He reportedly obtained an audience with
King Ferdinand I in Iași, presenting him a message on behalf of the Directorate. (as noted in March by his
Sfatul colleague
Vasile Harea, he also proposed their absorption by the
Romanian Army). Cijevschi soon became involved in debates with ethnic minority delegates over the adoption of Romanian as the Republic's official language. In February, he was assigned to an editorial committee for
Sfatuls
eponymous newspaper, transitioning it from a Romanian-titled publication in Russian to an all-Romanian sheet. Also that month, the paper hosted one of his own articles, with which he welcomed the creation of a Moldavian cultural society,
Făclia. The piece also featured his instructions to Bessarabian intellectuals that they should combat Bolshevik agitation among the peasants. On 14 March, signalling the Moldavian majority's steady accommodation of Romanian nationalism, Cijevschi was among the deputies who obtained that Pushkin Hall be assigned to
Făclia, which had pledged itself to the creation of a Romanian-language theater. Ten days later, he welcomed in Chișinău
Constantin Stere, the Bessarabian émigré and senior anti-Russian revolutionary, who had come to champion the project of merging Bessarabia with Romania. Nationalist scholar
Onisifor Ghibu, who was a witness to the event, argues that Cijevschi was already more right-wing than Stere: his speech indicated that "a state's existence should be based on national sentiment, rather than on the Russian concept of the state." Stere replied that the
Russian Republic was still a decent political model, and claimed to read Cijevschi's message as one of "love between Bessarabia's peoples"; according to Ghibu: "Mr Stere was refusing to even take note of the Bessarabian
intelligentsia's nationalist orientation". At the height of a
Romanian military intervention in Bessarabia, Cijevschi's
Sfatul Țării campaigning helped swing the vote in favor of union with Romania—as proclaimed by the legislative body on 9 April 1918.
Sfatul had hosted the
Prime Minister of Romania,
Alexandru Marghiloman, who had pleaded for unification, promising in return that Bessarabia would receive the
universal male suffrage and a
sweeping land reform, while
Sfatul would be preserved as the regional assembly. Cijevschi was himself enthusiastic about that bargain, and "held a long and fiery speech in Romanian", pleading with his colleagues that Bessarabia now had an "extraordinary historic opportunity" of twinning national emancipation with social justice. Within
Sfatul, he canvassed for an
open ballot, which ensured transparency, and therefore also legitimacy. He was also the one to read the act of union in its Russian translation. On the same day, he initiated Stere's election as honorary deputy for
Soroca.
Autonomist advocacy In the newly unified country, Cijevschi split with the Moldavian Bloc and, on 14 May, created his own
parliamentary party, called "National-Democratic Party". According to Țurcanu, the reasons for this change of direction "are insufficiently known"—though they relate to the fact that Cijevschi, like
Nicolae Alexandri,
Pantelimon Erhan, and
Ion Păscăluță, had only endorsed union with a preservation of regional self-rule. Overall, Cijevschi, a man of "great conceit", seemed "partly detached from the ideals which inspired the more enthusiastic Bessarabian fighters, when it came to the full affirmation of the Romanians' national rights", as well as "dispassionate" about the Bloc's projected land reform. According to Munteanu: "He had a particular idea as to the independence that should have been granted to Bessarabia within a
Greater Romania, with the
boyars' land destined for handing out to peasants and to soldiers who had fought in the various wars." A new Romanian administration, under Prime Minister
Ion I. C. Brătianu, took over in late 1918, introducing centralizing legislation and
de-Russification. Cijevschi now openly supported a return to regional autonomy: with Alexandri, Păscăluță,
Vasile Ghenzul, and several other
Sfatul members, he issued a formal protest against the
state of siege and demanded the reintroduction of
Russia's Civil Code. Their memorandum was welcomed by the
White émigré communities, who took it as proof that Bessarabia was still loyal to the defunct Russian Empire. Cijevschi's parliamentary mandate expired on 27 November 1918.
Ion Inculeț, the former
Moldavian President, was critical of the League. Seeing it as a venue for splitting the nationalist vote, he concluded: "It cannot have ties within the people, since it is made up of landowners." As an exponent of the Bessarabian conservative caucus,
Vasile Stroescu admired the League for "[saying] that land reform, in its existing shape, is nothing but land-theft". After this episode, Cijevschi withdrew from national politics. As argued by Țurcanu, he was partly validated in feeling "disgusted" by the corruption of Brătianu and other Romanian politicians. However, in May 1921, Cijevschi organized commemorations for the prime minister's father,
Ion C. Brătianu, recognized a founder of
Romanian liberalism; the initiative committee also comprised various other intellectuals, including Herța,
Paul Gore,
Daniel Ciugureanu,
Ștefan Ciobanu,
Ludovic Dauș, and
Gherman Pântea. Until January 1922, he handled internal affairs for the national government's Bessarabian Directorate, being then replaced by
Vasile Bârcă. Still involved with the Moldavian Veterans' Association, and employed for a while by the Chișinău Community Bank, he worked mainly as a civil servant for the
Mayor of Chișinău, supervising the local schools. As a speaker of "Oriental languages", he was asked to review the archeological finds at
Galilești, but could not read the mysterious inscriptions. Cijevschi's activity was primarily focused on the
Art Academy, which he helped refurbish. Under his watch as head of the local Fine Arts Society (1921–1926), According to a report put out in September 1922 by
Adevărul daily, Cijevschi was in fact a political associate of Inculeț, who ended up aligning himself with Brătianu's governing
National Liberals; this affiliation also allowed Cijevschi to maintain his position within Chișinău's city government—effectively, as the unelected Vice Mayor. Physician I. Duscian made similar claims in
Universul paper, adding allegations that Cijevschi was forcing inmates of public orphanages to only speak Russian. By March 1923, Cijevschi had established contacts with the opposition
Romanian National Party (PNR), which was trying to court Bessarabian voters. As noted by
Universul, he was joined in this effort by a diverse group of regionalists, also comprising jaded nationalists such as Pelivan, and one former member of the
Black Hundreds. In October, activist Ion Negoiescu alleged that Cijevschi had become a political client of the PNR, which was relying on him to build a regional chapter. According to Negoiescu, this was unacceptable, since Cijevschi, in addition to being "
anti-Romanian", had a "penchant for belonging to several political parties at the same time". In his own overview,
Transnistrian academic
Piotr Șornikov sees Cijevschi as "one of the founders of the Bessarabian autonomist movement", in turn located on the "moderate wing of the Bessarabian liberation movement" and connected to the notion of
Moldavian ethnic distinctiveness.
Final scandals, illness, and death Meanwhile, the
Nashe Slovo team mounted attacks on a local
Senator,
Iosif Sanielevici, who responded in the rival paper,
Novoye Slovo, allegedly calling Cijevschi a blackmailer and a hooligan. Cijevschi had asked for Sanielevici to be tried as a libeler, but his request was denied by the local prosecutor; according to
Adevărul, this was the government's way of suggesting that Sanielevici was right about Cijevschi. After September 1924, Cijevschi was reviving his critique of the National Liberals, voicing his defense of
Tatarbunary insurgents. Cijevschi had by then established another tribune,
Bessarabskaya Zhizn, Cijevschi was defending the newly formed
Bessarabian Metropolis against accusations of "
Russophilia", proposing that Russian Orthodoxy was always more developed than in other countries, and that clergymen were always prone to "look eastwards" for religious guidance. In January 1928, on the tenth anniversary of the Moldavian Democratic Republic's independence, he spoke about the need for a "large-scale decentralization" in all Romanian and European regions. He and Cristi appeared alongside their centralizing rivals, including in official photographs of the events—indicating to Țurcanu that their support of autonomy had never turned into full-blown secessionism. In September, he was made an officer of the
Star of Romania on behalf of the junior king,
Michael I. On 27 February 1929, Cijevschi was interviewed by
Alexandru Terziman for
Dimineața daily, criticizing the National Liberal authorities for still maintaining the state of siege. He assessed that there was no real threat of a communist insurgency, since the region's core population were "Moldavian peasants, gentle and hard-working"; in his view, the Romanian public was wrong to demand a ban on Chișinău's Russian-language press, noting that local Russian newspaper were generally anti-communist. He also warned that social turmoil could result from a prolonged administrative abuse, and demanded for a "good an honest administration", with power devolved to a regional government. Around then, Cijevschi was editorial secretary of
Bessarabskoye Slovo, a Russian-language daily put out by Ciugureanu. Its publication was followed with concern by Romania's secret police, the
Siguranța, which made note that one of Cijevschi's employees, Simon Ocner, had been sentenced as a
Soviet spy; the report also assessed that
Bessarabskoye Slovo had a readership of 40,000, many of whom were Russophiles and
Bessarabian Jews. During his final decade, Cijevschi dabbled in fiction writing: the short story
Unei prietene ("To a Lady Friend") was published by
Viața Basarabiei magazine in 1934, Aged 50, he was reportedly killed by "war wounds and some incurable diseases". ==Legacy==