The chairman of the Political Party “For People, Nature and Animals” (PONA) Ion Dron said that at the height of the election campaign, Victoriabank refused without reason to open a card account in the name of the party and even didn’t inform them about the refusal to open the account, as the law provides. According to him, these actions represent violations of the law and revenge taken over the statements he made in the public sphere.

In a news conference hosted by IPN, Ion Dron said that the PONA on September 26 was registered as a contender in the election to the Chisinau Municipal Council. On October 6, the PONA was registered as a contestant in the mayoral election in Grătiești and in the election to the Grătiești commune council. To be more visible, as the electoral legislation requires, he decided to campaign, including on social networking sites. To pay for campaigning, they need a card as there is no bank account for transfer.

The PONA leader noted that on October 16, he went to a branch of Victoriabank and asked for the list of documents needed to open an account and to be issued with a card. Under regulations of the Central Election Commission, the banks should open a bank account for a registered party within three workdays of the submission of the application. The three days expired in October 20. Eight workdays passed and he only yesterday found out that the bank refused to open an account. The same regulations provide that the banks within three workdays should inform the party or the person about the refusal to register an account. But Victoriabank hasn’t informed them about this refusal so far.

Ion Dron stated that the reasons for which the banks refused to open an account and didn’t inform about this are unclear. He admitted that this can be due to his public statements, including about his rhetoric inquiries whether Victoriabank had ties with the bank fraud, as the former prosecutor general asserted in a conference on October 4, 2021.

“Dear friends, by way of this new conference, I call on the Prosecutor General’s Office to go to Victoriabank and collect the documents I submitted to have an account for the PONA opened as an offense is ongoing and this is called violation of equality of citizens’ rights, which is stipulated in Article 176 of the Criminal Code,” said Ion Dron.

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