Nastase has media skills; he nails his sound bites the way he used to put away weak lobs. His campaign has a catchy slogan: “He built a name, now he will rebuild a city.” He has endorsements from Los Angeles Mayor Richard Riordan and former New York City mayor David Dinkins. And he certainly knows a lot about big cities; he has lived high on the hog in many of them. But does he know how to run a big city? Although he is by far the best-known of the 47 candidates for mayor in the June 2 election, doubts about his ability to govern have been eating into a lead he piled up early in the campaign. He also has been hurt by running on the tick- et of the unpopular ruling Party of Social Democracy. Last week one opinion poll showed him leading his closest challenger, lawyer and trade unionist Victor Ciorbea, by only 24 percent to 23; another survey showed Nastase trailing by two points. At the moment, it seems likely that no one will win a majority in the first round, requiring a runoff later in June.
In his days as a star on the professional tennis circuit – he won the U.S. and French Opens and reached the finals at Wimbledon twice – Nastase never ran away from a fight. In fact, he started quite a few. The other players didn’t call him “Nasty” just because it echoed his name. His approach to the voters of Bucharest is equally truculent at times. “They don’t realize what they have in me,” he says. “It would be bad for Romania if I don’t win. It would be stupid not to vote for me.”
Many Romanians have fond memories of Nastase. While they cowered under the heel of dictator Nicolae Ceausescu, Nastase rebelled against all authority, screaming at tennis judges and partying heartily. While Romanians suffered in poverty, he lived it up overseas, traveling among the foreigners they weren’t even allowed to talk to. “We lived vicariously through him,” says Dan Guta, a Honda distributor in Bucharest.
Nastase owns houses in Paris and Miami and two homes in New York, where his wife, Alexandra, is raising their two children. But he never gave up his Romanian citizenship or his home in Bucharest. “I feel I should give something back,” he says. For now, all he can do is await the verdict of the electorate. According to a British paper, he told a woman journalist last week that he had only three things on his mind: “Winning this election, food and sex. So what is your room number?”
