At the end of the current Parliament’s mandate, the patriarchs of Moldovan politics Vladimir Voronin, Dumitru Diacov and Mihai Ghimpu sum up, make forecasts and outline the new political horizons. For Vladimir Voronin, whose political descendants now lead the most important parties, controlling also the main posts in the state, the horizons of the future seem gloomy. In a program on TVC21 channel broadcast on November 30, 2019, the leader of the Party of Communists of the Republic of Moldova (PCRM) spoke about what the independent candidates in single-member constituencies should expect in the electoral race prior to the elections of 2019: “The mechanism for registering independent candidates was designed so that these could be excluded from the electoral race at any moment.”
However, the Communist leader’s message hides a secret, even if Vladimir Voronin reveals the mechanism by which the independent candidates could be excluded from the electoral competition: “If they see that a candidate has authority in a constituency, this could be excluded at any time… the government invented the procedure for collecting signatures that can be invalidated if persons who signed for other politicians also signed for a particular candidate. There was also invented the integrity test that a candidate could fail because of a trivial thing. “There was invented the health check test. All these tests were invented to create barriers. For example, a candidate passed the integrity test, but will not be able to collect signatures. If a candidate gathered the signatures, this could fail the health test.”
Vladimir Voronin knowns what he says as the party that he heads and that educated many of the current political leaders, acted similarly when it was in power in 2001-2009. The most pertinent example in this regard is the collection of signatures for the Social Democratic Alliance (ASD) to initiate, in 2002, a legislative referendum on the amendment of the electoral system. Then the ASD collected the necessary number of signatures and the Central Election Commission (CEC) validated them, submitting to Parliament the documents that confirmed the correctness of the procedures for initiating the referendum. The legislative body was to only approve the holding of the referendum or to adopt that law without using the people’s vote. How did the Parliament controlled by the Communist majority act? Exactly as Vladimir Voronin anticipated that the current governors would act in relation to the independent candidates in the parliamentary elections of 2019. Then, in 2002, the Parliament’s legal commission for appointments and immunities started to examine the activity of the CEC, arguing the authenticity of signatures wasn’t determined well. It verified about 10% of the signatures, but became swiftly tired, informing society that many of the signatures were probably false. This is how that story ended and this shows that the PCRM hasn’t supported the mixed electoral system since that time.
From the aforementioned, we can deduce that Vladimir Voronin has the right to believe that his political descendants continue to keep the reflexes acquired when the PCRM dominated. However, there is something else that can explain why the leader of the PCRM is concerned about the independents in single-member constituencies. Indeed, why a politician who since early youth has been affiliated to a particular party, now cares about the potential independent candidates? The point is that the independents in single-member constituencies are put in equal conditions with the candidates of political parties. The requirements for all the candidates are the same. The only exception is that the party candidates, when applying for registration, should also present decisions concerning their fielding by party bodies.
So, the Communist leader’s plea can have a simpler explanation. It seems that the leader of the PCRM simply looks for excuses for his party not to run in single-member constituencies, but only in the national constituency. A lot of effort is needed for running in single-member constituencies as initiative groups for designating candidates need to be created, accounts for financing initiative groups should be opened, signatures for each candidate should be collected, financial reports should be compiled, about ten documents for each candidate should be formulated, etc. Why so much effort if only the struggle for a relative majority of votes makes sense in single-member constituencies? The PCRM does not really have chances of obtaining such a majority. Currently, only the parties led by former pupils of the PCRM have such chances. Instead, in the national constituency each vote counts for reaching the electoral threshold of 6%.
That’s why only the competition in the national constituency makes sense. In single-member constituencies, the PCRM would run not in its favor, but against the former pupils. Is it worth the effort if these pupils after the elections will be in power anyway, in one formula or another. In such circumstances, the PCRM would prefer to focus on elections in the national constituency only. So, Vladimir Voronin’s plea in favor of the independent candidates is actually in favor of the PCRM’s minimum effort.
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