A number of civil society organizations have launched a public campaign entitled “Countdown to fulfillment of the government’s promises: seven days – seven priorities”, within which, during seven days, there will be organized public events and enumerated the commitments that must be fulfilled by the end of the spring-summer session of Parliament.
In a news conference at IPN, chairman of the National Participation Council Sergiu Ostaf said the government still can fulfill the promises to increase the financial responsibility of parties in election campaigns, to strengthen the Central Election Commission’s role in making sure that the parties correctly use the funds in election campaigns and do not depend on the interests of oligarchs and economic groups.
According to Sergiu Ostaf, it is important to undertake the commitment to promote gender equality by introducing gender representation quotas, to strengthen public integrity, to adopt the 2% law, to promote anti-tobacco policies. The government must also fulfill the promise to ensure transparency in media ownership, at public tender contests and in the privatization of public property.
The representative of the Coalition for Free and Fair Elections Nicolae Panfil said the financing of political parties and election campaigns is one of the major shortcomings of the government. “We made effort to promote the legislation on the financing of political parties and election campaigns. Unfortunately, the bills approved by the Government weren’t examined by Parliament. It happened that the bills were included in the Parliament’s agenda, but disappeared from it the next day. We are concerned about the inconsistent actions of Parliament and hope that the political parties will return to this subject,” he stated.
Nicolae Panfil noted that the legislation on the financing of political parties and election campaigns will give the Central Election Commission the powers needed to monitor and control the costs incurred by parties and candidates. The bills to make the political parties more responsible specify what a party risks if it uses undeclared funds and does not appropriately report the incomes and costs. In the previous election campaigns, Moldova faced problems in this respect. These problems may repeat in this autumn’s election campaign.
Nicolae Panfil said a mechanism is needed to determine where the money comes from and how they are used in election campaigns. The bills submitted to Parliament contain solutions and, if their adoption is delayed, Moldova will not have a clean political class after this autumn’s legislative elections and the local elections of next year.
