The negative practices ascertained after the new local mayoral elections held in Chisinau could be extended to the upcoming parliamentary elections that will take place based on the mixed electoral system. The application of selective justice by the judicial system is a conclusive example. This practice can be used in single-member constituencies, consider representatives of the Civic Coalition for Free and Fair Elections who made public a statement whereby they expressed their profound concern about the court judgements by which the mayoral elections held in Chisinau municipality were invalidated. The signatories request the courts of law to quash the judgments passed on June 19 and, respectively, June 21.
In a news conference at IPN, Pavel Postica, programs director of Promo-LEX Association, said another example is the case of the Shor Party’s candidate who ran for mayor in Jora de Mijloc village of Orhei district, where claims about violations were indeed filed. The contender who committed violations should have been penalized with the exclusion from the race and, implicitly, the elections should have been nullified, but the election there was validated. On the other hand, in the case of Chisinau municipality, for a minor violation that is punished with a fine, the election was invalidated.
“If the courts of law pronounce sentences based on their internal motivation, which is most probably ill-intentioned, and on the defective implementation of the law, we can witness rather negative scenarios. In particular single-member constituencies, the elections can be validated, while in others they can be invalidated. This can evidently help or, on the contrary, compromise the formation of a majority on Moldova’s Parliament,” stated Pavel Postica.
According to the executive director of the Association for Participatory Democracy ADEPT Igor Botan, the citizens of the Republic of Moldova should form the own conclusions. There are constituencies with desirable and undesirable winners. The undesirable winners are eliminated. This is evident at least from the current context.
Executive director of the Independent Journalism Center Nadine Gogu said the statement also signals the lack of transparency during the examination of the case by the ordinary court, when the journalists were banned access to the courtroom. “When our colleagues from the press do not have access to first-hand information, there is always place for speculations, interpretations and misinformation,” stated Nadine Gogu.
The signatories noted the abstract decisions of the courts of law undermine the whole electoral process that should end with the election of the mayor of Chisinau municipality, as the law provides. If the courts invalidated the elections, they should have exactly and unequivocally identified those to blame that were to be eliminated from the electoral competition and the election should have been rerun. This wasn’t done and the impact of the decisions caused the voters’ protest.
The statement was signed by the members of the Civic Coalition for Free and Fair Elections that consists of 35 organizations and by the members of the National Platform of the Eastern Partnership Civil Society Forum and other nongovernmental organizations.
