PAS MP Vasile Grădinaru explained the parliamentary majority’s decision to amend the electoral legislation so that the presidential election can be held simultaneously with the referendum announced by Maia Sandu. According to the MP, the two electoral exercises can take place on the same day as the 2014 decision by the Constitutional Court refers not to referendums, but to elections. So, two types of national elections cannot take place on the same day, but a referendum can take place concurrently with an election, IPN reports.
At the end of the parliamentary session, the MPs of the ruling party PAS adopted an amendment to the Electoral Code by which the possibility for presidential elections to be held simultaneously with a national referendum is introduced into the national legislation.
“If we analyze the turnout of voters in all elections, of all times, we see that most of the citizens vote in the presidential elections. Concurrent holding of this election with the referendum will have a greater impact and the referendum will be much more representative. Whatever the decision is, it will represent the will of the people. In order to exclude any interpretations, we came up with this change so that it is written in black and white that it is possible to organize these two types of elections simultaneously,” PAS MP Vasile Gradinaru stated in the program “Resumé” on RliveTV.
According to the PAS MP, those who make reference to the 2014 Constitutional Court decision mix up elections with referendums. The judges of the Court prohibited the simultaneous holding of two types of elections, but allowed holding an election and a referendum on the same day.
“I encourage you to carefully read the Constitutional Court decision and draw attention to two things. Those who refer to that decision by the Constitutional Court have not read it carefully. That decision concerns the elections. We should take the Electoral Code and read what an election means. Elections can be parliamentary, presidential and local. A referendum cannot be like this. Referenda are not national elections. Moreover, if we analyze the Constitutional Court’s decision to validate the 2019 referendum, the Court did not object that the referendum took place on the same day as the national elections. We passed this law. If anyone has objections to it, they can challenge it in the Constitutional Court,” said Vasile Gradinaru.
At the end of December, President Maia Sandu requested Parliament to organize a referendum on Moldova’s accession to the European Union. The initiative was launched after the European Council decided to open EU-Moldova accession negotiations.
