A good election campaign is when there is a mélange of well-argued messages and the people’s feelings of patriotism and national unity, political analyst Igor Botan stated in the public debate “Electoral technologies and electoral technologists: lessons learned and lessons to be learned from the campaign prior to presidential elections”, staged by IPN News Agency and Radio Moldova. He noted he would not call for patriotism and national unity as he considers these are inborn feelings and invoking them in the election campaign is like performing political circus, but the electoral technologies recommend doing this.
Speaking about the performance of the electoral staff of the Socialist candidate for President, Igor Botan, who is the IPN project’s standing expert, said this was only seemingly impressive. The dissemination of lies about the challenger of Igor Dodon, including by the party press, is unacceptable and such a thing should be penalized for the election campaigns to be proper in the future.
“The staff should learn that a victory won at any cost is a bad strategy that leads to the isolation of the winner. In time this can be penalized by the own voters, when this will not deliver many of the electoral promises owing to the limited powers of the President. Victory at any cost is a very dangerous thing,” stated Igor Botan.
“The methods we use must apply to the people’s feelings, but must not infringe on their private life and must not refer to their phobias that can be exploited blatantly. You had a very powerful trump card as no one in this country is against improving the relations with Russia, but, when Russia imposed the ban, it invoked the presence of chemical substances in the Moldovan products. Now the presence of chemical substances depends on who holds the office of President. It is about political implications, not sanitary norms. I understand that this is a political game, but there are some red lines that must not be crossed,” Igor Botan said, addressing the member of Igor Dodon’s electoral staff attending the debate.
As to the electoral message of the candidate of the Party “Action and Solidary” Maia Sandu, the expert said this was rather appropriate, but it is usually those who believe that the end justifies the means who win.
The public debate “Electoral technologies and electoral technologists: lessons learned and lessons to be learned from the campaign prior to presidential elections” is the 66th of the series of debates “Developing political culture by public debates” that are held by IPN in partnership with Radio Moldova and with support from the Hanns Seidel Foundation of Germany.
