Patria-Rodina stays off elections, backs Communists

The Socialists Party “Patria-Rodina” announced on Wednesday, February 11, that it wouldn’t participate in the parliamentary elections of April 5 and it would back the Communists Party (PCRM). After negotiations, “Patria-Rodina” obtained a seat on the list of the PCRM candidates, Info-Prim Neo reports. Eduard Smirnov, the leader of “Patria-Rodina,” elected 10 days ago, stated that the party made this decision because Moldova needs a steady majority in the Parliament now. According to him, the PCRM has the potential and the leading experience for the development of Moldova in the conditions of the world economic crisis. Smirnov also said that those two parties are very close ideologically, both being socially-oriented. Valentin Krylov, the secretary of the executive committee of the Socialist Party “Patria-Rodina,” said that the party has been cooperating with the PCRM since 1994, participating together in the local general elections of 1999 and 2003. According to Krylov, the party decided to stay off the elections because it has no real chance to get over the electoral threshold of 6% and it doesn’t want that the votes it obtains should go to opposition parties. “We obtained 5% in the previous elections. If now we obtain 4-5%, half of the votes will be distributed to our opposition, that is destructive and anti-statal,” Krylov specified. “Patria-Rodina” declares itself satisfied with the negotiations with the PCRM, after which former president of the party Veronica Abramciuc was included under number 22 on the PCRM's list. The Socialists Party as a component part of the electoral bloc “Patria-Rodina,” got 4.97% votes in the 2005 parliamentary elections, what didn’t allow it to jump over the electoral threshold. The Socialists Party from Moldova (PSRM) was created by the former members of the Socialist Party from Moldova (PSM), who had left the party at the beginning of 1996 because of strategic and ideological reasons. In 2004, the PSRM changed its name into the Socialists Party “Patria-Rodina.”