Mayor Ion Ceban on Monday morning blocked a section of Ștefan cel Mare Blvd with vehicles owned by the City Hall. He said that this way he wanted to show that such cases should be dealt with by the law not by the local public administration, IPN reports.

“These are the vehicles owned by the Chisinau City Hall and we intentionally, in accordance with Article 225 of the Contravention Code, barred access to Ștefan cel Mare Blvd. Personally, I will pay the fine for non-compliance,” said Ion Ceban.

The mayor noted that when someone intends to block the main artery of the capital city, these are held accountable in accordance with the law. He referred to the people protesting downtown. “Not the City Hall authorizes them, not the City Hall intervenes. The police should intervene in accordance with the legal provisions. The assertions made yesterday and the previous weeks by the Party of Action and Solidarity, which said that the City Hall authorizes the blocking of Ștefan cel Mare Blvd near the Presidential Palace and Parliament Building, are a gross lie. If you have an authorization to block Ștefan cel Mare Blvd please present it. There is no such an authorization,” stated Ion Ceban.

The mayor said the Government deliberately cheats. The Chisinau City Hall does not have police. Ion Ceban today made an approach to the central public authorities to unblock the street. He noted that the Contravention Code provides the police should intervene when a street is blocked.

A section of Ștefan cel Mare și Sfânt Blvd was blocked after protesters mobilized by the Shor Party pitched more tents on the roadway. The political party on Sunday said the number of people who protest nonstop in central Chisinau increases and 100 more tents were therefore put up downtown. The General Police Inspectorate noted that it repeatedly asked the Chisinau City Hall to request that the protest organizers should relocate the tents and should not allow blocking traffic within the permanent protest. But the City Hall’s representative left the place of the protest without taking the necessary measures. A relevant letter was sent again to the mayor general today. Protesters’ actions are being examined and an investigation into the blocking of traffic was launched.