Rulers admit crisis, after stating otherwise in election campaign

“The economic situation in Moldova goes on being difficult, but there emerged the first improvement signs in May,” outgoing first deputy prime-minister Igor Dodon stated at a news conference on Tuesday. He said Moldova had been better prepared to face the crisis than other neighboring countries. Igor Dodon was not certain that a president would be elected on June 3, but said the government in office had ready two scenarios to steer the country through the financial and economic crisis, Info-Prim Neo reports. The deputy premier, who's also the minister for economy and commerce, said the government had a reserve of levers to make decisions in the crisis, but there were fewer and fewer of them left and a functioning parliament was necessary to insure the legal basis. “We felt that during the first months of the year, the crisis hit the real sector of the Moldovan economy,” said Igor Dodon, an MP elected on the list of the Communists Party after the recent parliamentary poll. Before the April 5 vote, the rulers would state Moldova was not affected by the world crisis. The economy minister assessed the economic contraction at 24-25% in quarter 1, as drops were registered in exports, imports and industry. For the first time this year, the incomes from exports and the foreign payments from Moldovans working abroad increased in May. In January, the revenues from exports stood at $6 million daily, from the migrant workers – $3.4 million. The latter ones' transfers were $2.4 million in April, but they rose to 4.2 million in May. Referring to the banking sector, Dodon said the banks had enough liquidities, after the daily demand was $50 million, much exceeding the offer, during the first months of the year. In another context, when asked about the legality of the government's decision to impose visas on Romanians, the outgoing deputy premier said the decision was perfectly legal and only the Constitutional Court may possibly declare it void. A research published by lawyers hired by the think tank ADEPT shows that imposing visas only for one EU country is illegal since the visas for the EU citizens had been annulled through a law.