One day after being adopted by Parliament and promulgated by the President, the law to amend the Election Code and introduce the mixed-member electoral system was published in the Official Gazette on July 21, IPN reports.
The parliamentary elections will be held based on one national constituency that will cover the whole territory of the Republic of Moldova and the polling places abroad and based on 51 single-member constituencies, including districts formed on the left side of the Nistru and abroad. Thus, 50 MPs will be chosen in the national constituency based on party lists and on the proportional representation vote. Another 51 MPs will be chosen based on the majority vote, by one in each of the 51 single-member constituencies. The single-member districts will embrace 55,000 to 60,000 persons with the right to vote.
By 5,000 ballots will be sent to the electoral bureaus of polling places established outside Moldova’s borders. The electoral bureaus inside the country will get by 3,000 ballots. For the voters from Transnistria, polling places will be set up on the territory of the Republic of Moldova.
The party and/or electoral bloc can submit a list of candidates for the national constituency. This should include at least 30 persons and at most 55 persons and by one candidate for each single-member constituency. To be registered by the electoral constituency council, the candidate for the single-member constituency should present subscription lists with the signatures of at least 500 and at most 1,000 supporters eligible to vote from the single-member distrait where this intends to run. A female candidate can be registered if this presents the signatures of at least 250 and at most 500 supporters eligible to vote from the constituency where this intends to run.
The political parties that will have at least 40% of female candidates on their list of candidates for single-member districts will benefit from a budget support increase of 10% of the allotments for the given party during a budgetary year and from a multiplication coefficient for each female candidate chosen in the single-member constituency.
The caps on donations made by private individuals and legal entities to the Electoral Fund for an election campaign will be 50 and, respectively, 100 average monthly official salaries for a respective year.
The date of legislative elections will be set by a Parliament decision at least 60 days before the election day. Early elections will take place in at least 60 days and not later than three months of the dissolution of Parliament.
The election campaign prior to the parliamentary elections starts not earlier than 30 days before the election day. If no MP is elected in the single-member constituency in the parliamentary elections, the Central Election Commission organizes runoff elections in the given district in two weeks. If the elections are invalidated as a result of the runoff or the post of MP falls vacant, the Commission sets the date of new elections that are held in at least 60 days of the date the election outcome is nullified, but not later than in three months of this date.
