Parliament approves President’s initiatives on economy liberalisation

On Friday, April 20, the Parliament passed in first reading the initiatives of Moldovan President Vladimir Voronin. As he says, the initiatives aim at liberalising the economy. The project was presented in the Parliament by the head of state, while the related discussions lasted about three hours. The MPs’ views on this draft law were different. While some of them have criticised it, the others mentioned the necessity of these reforms for the economic development and attraction of investments in Moldova. MP Ion Gutu stated that he doubts the sincerity of this initiative. According to him, these reforms show the fact that the national economy is in a deep crisis. GDP goes down, inflation grows, and the trade balance reached huge proportions etc. However, the amnesty of the capital will not bring results, having the aim to massively privatise the enterprises which have debts. MP Gheorghe Susarenco stated that the goal of this project is to legalise all that was stolen in the last ten years. According to Anatol Taranu, this is not a liberal law, as it is said. Mp Iurie Bolboceanu said that the project is designed for the government party to receive, on the eve of the election campaign, bonuses from the companies which will be exempted from debts. Despite the opposition, the project was supported by the communist MPs and Christian Democrats. Eugenia Ostapciuc, leader of communists in Parliament, said that the the goal of the initiative is to create a more favourable climate for business, to accelerate the economic development. Vice speaker Iurie Rosca stated that in PCDP’s opinion the initiative is necessary and opportune. According to him, the three components of the set of initiatives will have a positive impact on the national economy, will contribute to strengthening the trust between businesspeople and state’s institutions and will significantly improve the investment climate in Moldova. According to one of the initiatives, companies which will use their incomes for investments will not pay the income tax of 15%. In case dividends will be paid (using incomes for consumption) – the 15% tax will be kept. As the head of state says, this initiative aims at determining investors to reinvest the obtained profit for expanding and developing their businesses. The other two initiatives promise to provide fiscal and capital amnesty. In the first case, all the debts, fines and penalties which had to be transffered to the State Budget until 1 January 2007 will be cancelled. All the distraints levied on the assets of economic entities will be annulled, and the inspection bodies will be prohibited to verify previous fiscal periods, but the debts at the other chapters of the national public budget will have to be paid. At the same time, starting January 1, it is proposed to increase the penalties for not paying taxes to the national public budget.