The Chisinau councilors of the Political Party “Our Party” (PPPN) say the Ministry of the Interior, in breach of the law, profited from the Chisinau City Hall’s reserve fund and transported police officers to the September 17 protest with money from this. The councilors consider there are reasons to believe that an illegal scheme to use municipal funds has been applied systemically, IPN reports.
PPPN councilor Ilian Casu told a news conference that on September 17 the Chisinau Bus Company provided 11 buses for taking police officers to the protest. As to the governmental decree that regulates the relations between different levels of government, the councilor said such services should be paid by the client, not by the supplier. “We were told that the Ministry of the Interior acted similarly in other protests. The Ministry didn’t pay for the used buses,” stated Ilian Casu.
Head of the PPPN group on the Municipal Council Elena Panus noted that the reserve fund of Chisinau is needed to allocate assistance, including to socially deprived groups of people. “A large number of residents of Chisinau seek support, especially for children. It happens that tens of thousands of euros are needed to save lives, but we can allocate only several thousand lei. In such a situation, acting mayor Nistor Grozavu makes orders to satisfy the needs of the Ministry of the Interior with money from the fund,” she stated.
Contacted by IPN, head of the Ministry’s communication division Alina Zbanca said that under the Law on the Police and the Status of Police Officer, the police are a specialized public institution of the state whose duty is to defend the rights and fundamental freedoms of people by maintaining, ensuring and restoring public order and security. The same law provides that the police force is funded from the state budget and other sources that are not banned by the law and the local public authorities can finance activities of the local police subdivisions aimed at maintaining public order and security at the local level with money from the own budgets.
