The Association of Advertising Agencies of Moldova calls upon the law enforcement bodies to examine the decision by Mayor Dorin Chirtoaca to take away a number of billboards in Chisinau. In a news conference at IPN, members of the Association requested the Prosecutor General’s Office, the National Anticorruption Center and the Competition Council to verify the legality of the ‘incursions’ into the advertising market of Chisinau so as to prevent its monopolization.
According to Association’s members, there are suspicions that the relevant mayor’s decision of February 8 is a possible case of large-scale corruption and protectionism. These should not be neglected by the rule of law institutions.
The Association’s deputy head Victoria Barba said she will also call on the Chisinau Municipal Council to check the legality of all the orders and intentions of the mayor general. “The executive of Chisinau municipality cannot assume duties to remodel a whole market and to destroy what has been created during many decades,” she stated.
According to Victoria Barba, the companies that founded the outdoor advertising market in Chisinau have worked for over 25 years. At the beginning, the billboards were the only source of street lighting. The business entities are ready for a dialogue, but will not allow illegalities to be committed on the pretext of bringing things in order in the city.
Vice director of an outdoor advertising company Iurie Caluja said the economic entities that worked in the field in 2007 didn’t receive new authorizations. “All the new authorizations were given to affiliated companies. Furthermore, a moratorium on the issuing of new authorizations was instituted in 2011. If the authorizations for the places that the mayor wants now to be cleaned hadn’t been extended, the city would have been cleaned in a natural way,” he stated.
The Association’s data show that there are about 50,000 square meters of billboards in the municipality of Chisinau. Most of these are concentrated in the big intersections of Chisinau.
