The noncommercial organizations (NCOs) do not have the right to provide financial support to political parties directly or indirectly and cannot provide services in the electoral period. They also cannot campaign and therefore cannot distribute messages to persuade a person to vote for a particular candidate. But the NCOs will be able to monitor the elections and to stage debates between candidates running in elections. These are some of the new provisions of the law on noncommercial organizations that took effect on August 27. These were presented in a national conference organized by the Legal Resources Center of Moldova, IPN reports.
Legal adviser of the Legal Resources Center Ilie Chirtoacă said that even if the previous legislation was good, it was designed at the end of the 1990s and didn’t meet the current realities. The new law simplifies the procedure for registering an organization, which became free, as the amendment of the constitutive documents did. The registration period was shortened to 15 days from 30 days earlier. The period of validity of constitutive documents was extended from 30 days to 90 days. The new version of the law presents an exhaustive list of the documents required for registration.
The law stipulates a more flexible model for internal organization, institutes fair-play rules for state financing of noncommercial organizations, clearly defines the activities that are permitted and not permitted to NCOs, maintains the conditions of transparency in the activity of NCOs and changes the rules concerning the public utility status. There were simplified the conditions that should be met for providing this status.
Ilie Chirtoacă noted the new law eliminates the unjustified restrictions existing in the previous version. For example, before the adoption of the new law, the legal entities – limited liability or joint stock companies – could not be the founders of a noncommercial organization and this created practical difficulties. Earlier, there were restrictions related to nationality. The foreign citizens didn’t have the right to be members of the board of an organization. Now the foreigners can form part of the administration and surveillance boards.
Other possibilities offered by the new law include the reservation of the name through e-mail for a period of up to six months and this service is free. The law also allows the organizations to use in names the words “Moldova” and “Republic of Moldova” or the names of other administrative units free and without asking for permission. According to the expert, this is beneficial to the association of natives that earlier had to obtain the administration’s permission.
Legal Resources Center president Vladislav Gribincea said that among the activities that the NCOs can perform are the economic activities and social entrepreneurship. They can state their opinion on the programs of political parties and election runners. The NCOs are obliged to adjust their statutes if the legislation is amended and to keep a record of their members, in the case of public associations. They must also present documents confirming the statutes, change of the legal address, electronic address, head office and composition of the administration and control bodies to the state registration body within three months.
The national conference “Resilience in Times of Crisis” was staged by the Legal Resources Center of Moldova in the framework of the project “Promoting rule of law in Moldova through civil society oversight” that is implemented by the Center with support from USAID.
