Government will achieve nothing without compromise, debates

The people’s representatives need a compromise, regardless of their standing, be it in the ruling seats or in the opposition. A statement in this sense was made by Dumitru Diacov, head of the Party of Democrats’ (PDM) fraction, at the public debates “The weapon, art and cross of political compromise” organized by the news agency Info-Prim Neo as part of the project “Developing political culture through public debates”, supported by the German Foundation Hanns Seidel. Dumitru Diacov said that Moldovan politicians lack the tendency to seek for a reasonable compromise in their act of governing. “I am one of those who have been carrying the cross of compromise for many years now; I understood that it is impossible to achieve anything without compromises. We have Parties that are willing to compromise to a certain extent, and we have Parties that are hardly willing to do so; they are leftist, or rightist, close to extremes. This is how people think, and everyone wants to keep their supporters close, and the more warring they are, the closer they keep their voters”, said the Democrats’ leader. Liberal-Democrat MP Ghenadie Ciobanu said that if politicians want progress, they must answer some questions: “What kind of State do they want? Where are they headed? How do they plan to get there?”, because sometimes they have completely incompatible ideas on the matter. “Compromise must reached in ways other than sitting down at the negotiations’ table”, said the MP, adding that the Alliance has a well-defined goal, whereas the opposition does not know where it is headed. “Sometimes it seems to that the opposition reaches towards compromise as a weapon, not as an instrument”, added Ghenadie Ciobanu. Liberal MP Valeriu Munteanu pointed out that there is a certain trend in Moldova, the wagon has moved, but there are problems that require immediate solution or we will still be in the same situation after 20 years. “We said that we want to follow the European integration path, and if it were clear for everyone, maybe other topics, partly useless, would’ve not surfaced. The second issue is the existence of the Party of Communists itself; this monster, this Cyclops did not reform itself after so many years: same symbols, same slogans, even the same habits. It is virtually impossible for the PL to compromise with an unreformed Communist Party, which insists of protecting the crimes of a totalitarian regime”, the Liberal MP stated. On the other hand, Communist MP Artur Resetnicov stated that the cooperation process between the Government and the opposition, not only stayed the same in the last years, but actually regressed. “I couldn’t praise the current situation. If a Party is in the opposition, that doesn’t mean that its opinions should not be heard, that its proposals shouldn’t be debated; we reached a point when proposals that did not reach the debates are being annulled”, commented Artur Resetnicov, representative of the Parliamentary opposition at the debates. Ion Tabirta, deputy director of Political Consultancy and Strategic Researches Center “Politicon”, said that it is hard for him to say which of the political compromise models is worth following. The expert hesitated to answer when asked which compromise model is better, the one Communists used with the opposition, in their governing period, or the European Integration Alliance’s (AIE) one. “Unfortunately, we did not go through the points that unite us, but through those which separate us. Compromise is often the warrant of growth; I think we need pact, one that would be respected by all parties”, concluded the “Politicon” deputy director. Igor Botan, permanent expert in the public debates organized by Info-Prim Neo, pointed out that Moldova has chances for a normal dialogue between the governing power and the opposition, such that the two reach compromise, and there are solutions to it. “The first solution is for the AIE to govern the country better than the Communists did it for 8 years. The society is split, 37% believe that the country was better governed by the Communists, whereas 30% claim that the Alliance governed it better. The difference is not great. Another solution is deliberation, and the project launched by Info-Prim Neo is an appropriate one”, said Igor Botan. He added that the Constitution should be improved, praising the PL initiative on the matter, but specified that all procedural norms should be respected. The public debate “The weapon, art and cross of political compromise” is the seventh of such activities, part of the “Developing political culture through public debates” project. The debaters mentioned, on several occasions, the importance of the project in developing clear communication between the political power and the society.