Who became Romanian President immediately after the 1989 Revolution?

The Romanian politician, Ion Iliescu, served as the President of Romania from 1989 until 1996, and from 2000 until 2004. Over the course of his extensive political career he was able to serve as a senator for the Social Democratic Party (PSD) from 1996 to 2000 and from 2004 until his retirement in 2008.

He is the son of a man who held very strong communist views. Iliescu’s interest in politics took root when he was a young man. He studied at the Bucharest Polytechnic Institute before moving to Russia to study at the Energy Institute of the Moscow University. He joined the Communist Party in 1953 and has been played a vital role in Romania’s politics since the early 1950s. By 1965, he had become a member of the Central Committee of the Romanian Communist Party. He then had ideas for change.

He became a protégé of the powerful Romanian politician Nicolae Ceaușescu. He was marginalized by his mentor when Ceaușescu saw the rising stature of Iliescu as a threat. Iliescu would oppose President Ceaușescu's harsh rule and would play a major role in the 1989 Romanian Revolution. After Ceaușescu was overthrown and executed, Iliescu become Romania’s first freely elected head of state. He was called an "independent social democrat". He had the reputation for being a populist. He was quickly seen as charismatic. People liked the way he resolved the Mineriad's miner interventions in Bucharest.

Under Iliescu, economic, social and political developments grew in very good ways!