The elections in the Republic of Moldova, which are now held on Sundays, could also be held on Saturdays with the possibility of extending voting for the next day. Such a proposal is stipulated in the new Electoral Code that was presented by the Central Election Commission. Another proposal is to organize polling places for a locality or for several localities where at least 500 voters, citizens of the Republic of Moldova with the right to vote, are outside the country on a temporary basis or settled abroad, IPN reports.

The new Electoral Code suggests amending the procedure for designating the members of the Central Election Commission, in particular changing the entities that are to propose members so that one member is named by the President, two members are named by the Government and two members are named by Parliament. The number of members is to be reduced from nine to seven and the activity of these is to be made permanent. Two of the members will proportionally represent the parliamentary majority and the opposition.

Experts of Promo-LEX Association support the mentioned changes. They recommended that in order to avoid the risk of the CEC members named by the Government and Parliament representing only the parliamentary majority, one of these two members who is to be designated by the Government should represent civil society organizations, as one of the two members nominated by the Superior Council of Magistracy should be a doctor of law.

Other regulations envision the extension of the categories of personal data in the financial reports of political parties and election contenders that are to be made public. These will include the name and surname, workplace and public posts and date of donation, sum of donation and method of making the donation.

The new Electoral Code will regulate the electoral procedures for collecting signatures in support of independent candidates for President of the Republic of Moldova and the procedure for presenting and verifying the list of signatures. The number of necessary signatures will be reduced and the citizens will be able to sign for several candidates, not only for one candidate as at the moment.