The provisions that ban electoral agitation on the day prior to the election day could be eliminated. The polling places and the areas close to these would be an exception. The parliamentary commission for appointments and immunities recommended drafting a bill to this effect and amending the Contravention Code so as to exclude the contravention component. The recommendations are stipulated in the report on the analysis, expertise and assessment of the electoral legislation based on which the Chisinau early mayoral elections were invalidated, IPN reports.
The commission took cognizance of the Constitutional Court’s judgment of September 6, 2018, by which it was ascertained that the Election Code’s provisions that enable the courts of law to nullify the local elections, if the violations committed during the elections or in vote count influence the election outcome, are in accordance with the good European practices.
In its report, the commission says the voiding of elections is not unprecedented in the electoral practice of Moldova. At least 32 cases of invalidation of elections for different reasons were recorded in Moldova. International practice is not unitary as regards campaigning on the election day and on the day before this, which is called “silence day”. The presence or absence of regulations concerning banning of campaigning on these days cannot affect the defined principles concerning electoral matters.
The report notes the current electoral legislation already contains norms that allow placing electoral posters, advertising announcements and other agitation materials, including on the election day, if they were set up earlier. It was established that difficulties are encountered in examining and punishing acts of campaigning on the election day, especially online. There were ascertained erroneous interpretations and hardly noticeable limits between the appeals to vote and electoral agitation. The ban on electoral agitation on the election day can be interpreted as restriction of the right to freedom of expression in the meaning of Article 10 of the ECHR.
The commission underlined the importance of the Internet as a specially influential channel of political communication, including for electoral agitation purposes, and recommended formulating regulations concerning electoral advertising services, electoral debates on the Internet and in the social media, taking into account the international practice, and clear provisions for combating online propaganda, especially fake news on the Internet.
A decision to analyze the electoral legislation based on which the Chisinau early mayoral elections were invalidated was adopted by Parliament on July 12. The opposition MPs criticized then the decision, saying this is a method of misleading the citizens and the development partners.
