Discriminatory treatment for Claudiu during the match with Ripensia

 

Following the discriminatory treatment of our police supporter with severe physical disability, Claudiu Socodol, we decided to contact him in order to elucidate the problem he had in the 17th stage, against the UVT Ripensia.

Q1. Hello! Thanks for the interview. What’s your name and tell us your history?

Hello! My name is Claudiu Socodol, I am 28 years old and following a cervical spine fracture, I am immobilized in a 12-year-old wheelchair. My degree of disability is severe with a personal assistant.

Q2. You are present at many matches of the Timișoara Polytechnic and we appreciate your devotion to our club. Since when do you actively participate in the matches of the Timișoara Polytechnic? Do you get to away matches?

Yes, since I was a small child I was a Poli supporter, and my passion is totally for Politehnica Timișoara. From 2007, when I was addicted to a wheelchair and dependent on the help of others, until 2012, due to post-accident depression, I avoided appearing at the stadium at Poli’s matches as a person with disabilities. I, the one who was not absent from the stadium, could not accept my condition. The suffering was overwhelming, hard to bear. Perhaps the most important matches in the history of this club (against teams like Sahtior, Stuttgart, Partizan Belgrade, the elimination of Steaua from the Romanian Cup, etc.) I saw them with tears in my eyes, between four walls. Since 2012, when I realized that modern football no longer represents me, being actually fed up with all the so-called owners who buried the teams of traditions in Romania, I decided to join the project initiated by the Timisoara Supporters Association “Druckeria” in collaboration with Polytechnic University of Timisoara. I watched from the outside how it grew in the first period and inevitably I identified in the characteristic principles and ideals within ASU Politehnica Timișoara. I was firmly convinced that I will regret if I do not see with my own eyes how this unique and unique project is growing at that moment in Romania. Together with my father, I started going to the Polytechnic matches, and from that moment I was absent from the stadium. The white-purple fans, the University, the members of Peluzei Sud Timișoara, the decision makers from Druckeria, all considered me one of them, a member of the violet family. In short, Politehnica Timișoara saw the devoted supporter in me and never isolated me because of the disability I suffer from.

 

Q3. A news item appeared in the media that disgusts us. Ripensia, the security company and the observer were overzealous, urging you to get out of the stadium. Can you explain to us where it all started?

In 9 years I can firmly say that I have more matches on the stadium in a wheelchair than many other healthy fans in the country. I stayed for Poli in rain, heat, wind or frost. In the first years of lower leagues, I roamed the region of Banat with Poli, later I don’t think I missed 2-3 matches in the third league season. I actively participate in every home game and every time I have the opportunity, together with my father, we join the trip because we identify with this football club.

Regarding what happened to me on Electrica Stadium, in the match against Ripensia, I want to tell you that I have never felt so humiliated. Before the start of the match I entered the field to watch the match. Wheelchair access must be done in this way because it is impossible to watch a football match behind the fence at the seat level. Of course, there are situations in which the grandstand has an access ramp for people with disabilities and in these conditions the field of view is perfect. “Electrica” ​​does not have the problem of such a thing, consequently, I watched the match at the grass level. The atmosphere intensified towards the end of the first half when a penalty was awarded for Ripensia following the intervention of the reserve referee who communicated to the central referee what he saw from my right, 3-4 meters away. Police officers present with hundreds in the covered grandstand at the “Electrica” ​​stadium began to protest vehemently and inevitably there were insults. The game continued, Ripensia scored from the penalty spot, and the players celebrated the goal in front of the tribune, at which point a bottle was thrown from the tribune and fell next to the reserve referee. He turned directly to me, thinking I had thrown, and, to my surprise, told the plant that I had to be evacuated from inside the field for insults and throwing objects on the field.

1. My physical deficiencies do not even allow me to put my hand over my head and am I found guilty of throwing a bottle 5 meters away ?! Very hilarious! I mention that at the entrance to the stadium I was searched and I did not have bottles or other blunt objects on me.
2. Did the insults come from a nucleus of hundreds of people and am I to blame? I am speechless when I tell you these details.

The security company came to me during the break and told me that I had to be evacuated from inside the field. RACED SEAT PERSON? That’s good. I know my rights, I have freedom of expression like any other citizen, and I have categorically refused this aspect. The members of the security company were also joined by the Ripensia delegate, Mr. Adrian Onica, who offended me by calling me “the one with a disability to go out”. My companion, respectively my father, at the hearing of these words and at the excessive zeal in removing me from the field, defended me because the security company and Mr. Onica threatened me with, I quote, “ready to take this cart out!” , “Here I make the law!”. In the meantime, the players entered the field, I informed the organizers of the match that I have the right according to Law 448/2006, on the rights of people with disabilities, that it should facilitate my access to sporting events, not restrict my horizons and not offend me by calling me “take out the cart” or “handicapped.” The plant refused to start the second myth until I was evacuated behind the fence.

Gentlemen, Romania of 2019 – the country that considers that a person addicted to a wheelchair is so dangerous for a football match that he is ordered to leave the field for the good development of the match.

Q4. And further, where did you have to watch the match? How was such discrimination possible?

From behind the fence, with zero visibility. Mr. Onica, the Ripensia club, the security company and the match watcher were overzealous and discriminated against me for my disability, humiliated as I have never been in 12 years since I was a wheelchair addict.

Q5. Do you intend to go through legal proceedings to get justice in your case?

Categorical! I will open a lawsuit in court and I will address the National Council for Combating Discrimination against Mr. Adrian Onica (Ripensia delegate), the Ripensia club and the security company.

Q6. Clau, thank you and we assure you of all our support!

I thank you for being with me and I want to express my full consideration for the Pressalert publication, which through the journalists present at the match reported for the first time publicly the discriminatory treatment I received.

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Politehnica Timișoara is the only club in Romania that participates in the Center for Access to Football in Europe (CAFE) Week of Action and on every occasion we publicly encourage the participation of people with disabilities in football matches. We strongly condemn those reported by our supporter above.