Manescu, Manea

Born Aug. 9, 1916, in Brăila. Governmental figure in the Socialist Republic of Rumania and economist; became a member of the Academy of the Socialist Republic of Rumania in 1974; decorated as a Hero of Socialist Labor in 1971.

A worker’s son, Mănescu graduated from an industrial and commercial academy in Bucharest in 1940. He has been a member of the Rumanian Communist Party (RCP) since 1936. After Rumania’s liberation from fascism, he was a party official in Ploe§ti from 1945 to 1949 and then worked in the apparatus of the RCP Central Committee. Vice-chairman of the State Planning Committee during 1950–51, Mănescu served as director of the Central Statistical Administration from 1951 to 1954, as minister of finance from 1955 to 1957, and as vice-chairman of the economic commission of the RCP Central Committee from 1957 to 1960.

Mänescu became a member of the RCP Central Committee in 1960 and was chief of its schools and public health department from 1960 to 1965. He served as a Central Committee secretary from 1965 to 1969 and again from 1969 to 1973 and as a candidate member of the Executive Committee of the RCP Central Committee from June 1966 to December 1968, becoming a full member in December 1968. Chairman of the Economic Council from 1967 to 1972, Mänescu then held the posts of vice-chairman of the State Council from 1969 to 1972, vice-chairman of the Council of Ministers and chairman of the State Planning Committee from October 1972 to March 1974, and member of the Permanent Presidium of the RCP Central Committee from February 1971 to March 1974. He has been prime minister of the Socialist Republic of Rumania since March 1974. Mänescu is the author of scholarly works on statistics, economic applications of cybernetics, and computer technology.