Municipal coalition fails again to pass Chisinau’s budget in first reading

The second attempt of the municipal coalition to pass today Chisinau’s budget in first reading has failed. While more than a week ago, on November 22, the budget draft was three votes short to pass, this time the City Council lacked just one vote of the required 26. At today’s City Council meeting, the budget draft was endorsed by the Liberal faction (11 councilmen), the Liberal-Democratic group (3 councilmen), the Social-Democratic faction (5 councilmen) and by 6 councilmen representing the Moldova Noastra Alliance Party (Pavel Caba, the chairman of the AMN faction, missed the meeting, citing health reasons). After the bill didn’t get the required number of votes, the voting procedure was discontinued. Heated discussions among the local councillors followed afterwards. Corina Fusu, councillor of the Liberal group, stepped in front of the rostrum to declare that the councillors who didn’t back the bill either “act against the citizens” or “go hand in hand with the Communists”. She was followed by Communist councillor Valeri Pavlov, who, seconds after staring his speech, was shouted down by Liberal Gheorghe Brega. The Liberal councillor accused Pavlov of taking the floor without permission, and said he would block the access to the microphone until Pavlov took his seat in the sitting room. The next to take the floor was the leader of the Social-Democratic faction, Eduard Musuc, who largely supported the position of Liberal Corina Fusu and urged the councillors to review their decision. Without reaching any agreement, the councillors requested a break. Before the draft was put for a vote, Communist Valerii Pavlov stated that his faction would not endorse the document in first reading, because the City Hall neglected the proposals formulated by the Communists at the previous meeting concerning mechanisms for increasing revenues for the next year. Pavlov argued that in 10 months this year alone the city coffers collected nearly 1.4 billion lei, while for the entire 2008 incomes are forecast to represent just 1.344 billion lei. “Apparently you hide the money; and that we shall never accept”, Pavlov pointed out. In his address to the City Council, Mayor Dorin Chirtoaca said that the municipality is experiencing an unprecedented situation, where the budget has no resources to rise. “The tax income collected from business entities is no longer transferred to the municipal budget. We do not have access to VAT anymore. Much of the city’s revenues are taken by the national budget and we are forced to get along on a budget similar to the one for 2007, given that there is no way for the municipality to collect the same extra revenues as this year and taking into account that the prices of utilities have risen”, said Dorin Chirtoaca. The mayor explained that the purpose of this budget is to enable the municipality to run the city better, but with lower resources, thanks to the government. “It is obviously, the political situation in 2009 depends very much on how the local administration will act in FY 2008”, said the mayor, adding that the deficit for the next year is 26 mln lei and still expected to rise as a result of certain investment projects. The draft budget provides for expenditure of 1.37 bln lei and incomes of 1.344 bln lei. According to the General Finance Division, the deficit will be covered from the money obtained from privatisation. The budget must be adopted by December 10.