The manager of Piata Centrala (Central Market) Municipal Enterprise, Ion Stratulat, was few steps away from getting fired at the request of the communist councillors that asked his dismissal on Friday, May 4, during the Chisinau Municipal Council (CMC) meeting. The strong determination of the communists to sack Stratulat was calmed down after he read the report on the enterprise’s financial results. According to him, in 2006, the Central Market registered a MDL 6.5 mln profit, while in 2005, before running the enterprise, the profit made up MDL 3.8 mln. Startulat has also pointed out that the profit is entirely absorbed by the enterprise, excluding the taxes that are regularly paid to the national budget. However, he admitted that a part of the profit could have been transferred to the local budget. Stratulat has also mentioned that in compliance with another CMC decision the profit accumulated in 2006 was entirely allotted for the construction of an agricultural marketplace for selling birds and other domestic animals. Stratulat says it is difficult to improve the present situation of the Central Market as the most part of the stalls and stores on the territory of the market were privatised back in 1996-2000. Of those 4.8 ha of the market, the municipal enterprise “Piata Centrala” is in fact administrating only 2.8 ha. The communist councillors showed dissatisfaction with the small amounts of money transferred to the local budget. According to them, those MDL 2 mln transferred annually do not correspond to the real number of stalls and stores placed on the territory of the market. In retort Stratulat said that the Municipal Enterprise “Piata Centrala” does not issue sales authorizations and therefore cannot keep record of the cash receipts of the vendors. The leader of the communist faction, Svetlana Popa, proposed to re-examine the issue during one of the next CMC sessions, and meanwhile to check the data provided by Stratulat. The councillor of the Social Action Bloc, Igor Crapivca, said that the situation of the Central Market is going to be examined by the CMC from the point of view of strategic development of this commercial complex. He has also proposed to institute a joint stock company formed of Central Market businessmen. This is how all the parties would be interested in finding a common strategic investor to make the Central Market look like a modern commercial complex. CMC councillor Oleg Cernei called his communist colleagues to withdraw their initiative on dismissing Ion Stratulat, specifying that it was the communist party councillors that promoted him and now it could look like a political settling of scores. Ion Stratulat was appointed by CMC as the administrative director of the Municipal Enterprise “Piata Centrala” in 2005, being selected from 12 candidates.