The MP of the Party of Socialists Bogdan Țîrdea launched a book entitled “Civil society in the Republic of Moldova: Sponsors. NGOcracy. Cultural wars”. According to the author, the network of NGOs became an octopus that infiltrated into all the branches of power, the mass media and scientific sphere. There were analyzed documents showing who finances these organizations, when, who and how much millions of euros and dollars got for denigrating particular politicians and parties and for supporting others, IPN reports.
The book consists of eight chapters, has 795 pages and over 1,400 bibliographic references. According to Bogdan Țîrdea, the first chapters are a scientific attempt to theoretically explain the genesis of civil society in the Republic of Moldova, starting with the 1940s. In 1992, there were 38 associations and the figure by now rose to almost 14,000. This was due to the signing of the Association Agreement with the European Union and of the Action Plan with NATO.
In a news conference, the author referred to three key foundations that he analyzed in his book: the European Foundation for Democracy, the National Endowment for Democracy, and Soros Foundation. He also makes reference to the Department for Romanians Everywhere.
Using the financial reports presented by the NGOs, the MP compiled the rankings of the budgets of NGOs. “The Association for Participatory Democracy ADEPT – Igor Boțan. He is known, has programs on TV8, was one of the heavyweights of the DA Platform, took part in the meetings of the PAS. Respectively, the budget for 2016 – over US$260,000. The Journalistic Investigations Center with a budget of US$328,000 in 2016. I think you know that this is led by Missis Cornelia Cozonac. The Partnership for Development Center with US$396,000 in 2019. The information center Genderdoc-M that defends the rights of the LGBT community – US$427,000 in 2017,” stated Bogdan Țîrdea.
“Transparency International – almost US$431,000 for 2014. The Institute for European Policies and Reforms led by Iulian Groza, who is now a consultant and is close to a known party of the right and to a well-known electoral candidate. The budget for 2015 – US$503,000.
“For you to understand, all these NGOs that I present today are connected to a political party that is now taking part in the election campaign and to a candidate. If you want evidence, we will provide it to you. Look first of all to the structure of the administration board of these NGOs. In many of them, there are one-two-three characters who are affiliated to this political party about which I speak.
The MP also referred to the Legal Resources Center of Moldova led by Vladislav Gribincea, saying that this did the justice sector reform, the prosecution service reform as a result of which the prosecutions service was fully captured by oligarchs. For 2018, the budget of this organization was over US$2.4 million. In 2018, the budget of the Promo-LEX Association was over US$2.5 million. “The budgets of these NGOs come from outside and the sums they use annually are exorbitant, but they don’t produce a visible social or economic impact. The budgets of these organizations are much higher than the budgets of the state institutions or for the state policies.”
“These NGOs declare such goals as democratization, liberalization, election monitoring, but in reality are instruments of control and influence of other states. They are instruments for external management through their leaders who actually work for particular donors, very often against the national interests,” stated Bogdan Țîrdea.
