LESSER OF TWO EVILS

As expected, the ninth parliamentary elections in modern Moldova ended with a draw. None of the elected political parties could take the seats required to establish the government.

Unlike in previous years, 101 members of the parliament were elected through a mixed-proportional system: 50 from party lists and 51 from individual constituencies.

As a result, the seats are distributed as follows: Party of Socialists of the Republic of Moldova (PSRM) — 34, Democratic Party of Moldova (PDM) — 30, ACUM — 27, Șor Party – 7, independents — 3.

Since Moldova is a parliamentary republic, the country still has a few weeks of uncertainty while four political parties bargain for power in the parliament. If they do not agree, then early elections may be held. This is a known practice in the post-Soviet history of Moldova.

Friends and Enemies

Both the Democratic Party of Moldova and ACUM bloc position themselves as pro-European, according to their programs. They support rapprochement with Romania, association agreement between the Republic of Moldova and the EU, NATO membership, and are known for their negative attitude towards Russia. It seems that nothing can stop them from joining the forces. However, it is not that simple. Personal relations between the leaders of both political blocs are based on mutual distrust and even outright hostility. To demonstrate that they are different from PDM, ACUM leaders declare their commitment to the statements of PDM members but call the latter corrupt and criminalised.

PSRM was founded in 1997 by the former members of the Socialist Party of Moldova. Formally, the party calls for the withdrawal from the EU Association Agreement and supports Moldova's membership in the Eurasian Economic Union. During the election campaign, the party promised to close the NATO representation office in Chisinau and to secure Moldova's membership in the Customs Union. On election posters hanging everywhere in Chisinau, the President of Moldova, the leader of PSRM, Igor Dodon, and the President of Russia, Vladimir Putin, warmly shake hands.

At the same time, Belarusian businessmen, who met with Dodon, claim that he was explaining to them the advantages of doing business in Moldova thanks to access to European markets. Opposition accuses the socialists and their leader of close cooperation with PDM and imitation of political competition.

It is also claimed that the Șor Party headed by the notorious businessman Ilan Shor, who most of the time lives in Moscow, is a shadow project of the PDM leader Vladimir Plahotniuc, as he needs Şor to secure the votes of the electorate of pro-Russian socialists. Thanks to the connections of his wife, singer Jasmin, Shor is friends with many high-ranking Kremlin officials, including the press secretary of the Russian president. In June 2017, the Chisinau court sentenced Shor to 7.5 years for a billion dollar theft committed in 2014 (12% of Moldova's GDP) from three Moldovan banks under his control. The case was transferred to the Appeals Court, which was eventually paused during the parliamentary elections. Intricate relations indeed!

Victory by all means

It is difficult to call the election campaign fair. Along the path to the parliament were mutual accusations, spread of fake news, compromising materials, sabotage of meetings with voters, death threats, accusations of attempted poisoning, criminal cases and other things that accompany any elections in any country.

Shortly before the elections, it was claimed that the head of the ruling PDM, businessman Vladimir Plahotniuc, was involved in an assassination attempt of the incumbent president Igor Dodon, the leader of PSRM. The planned event was supposed to take place after the elections. President strengthened his security, but the day before the election, his motorcade had an accident, fortunately with no harm to participants.

Leader of Our Party, Renato Usatii, stated that he receives daily mounted photographs showing the massacre of his loved ones. He believes that the organiser of this notorious act is Igor Dodon.

Maia Sandu, leader of the Action and Solidarity Party, and Andrei Năstase, head of Dignity and Truth Platform, who both formed the ACUM bloc, reported that they had found mercury in their blood more than a year ago. However, despite the treatment, the level of mercury in the blood does not decrease, indicating systematic poisoning. "We decided that before the elections, it is important to tell people about the degradation of the current government and what this regime can do," said Maia Sandu.

Their colleague, businessman Alexander Macedon, also confessed about heavy metal poisoning: "I confirm that my children, my wife and father-in-law became objects of a well-planned attack: we were poisoned with a mixture of toxic metals, including mercury."

Two days before the election, it suddenly became known that a criminal case was initiated against the leader of the ruling Democratic Party of Moldova, Vladimir Plahotniuc. He is accused of stealing more than 37 billion rubles (more than 1 billion euros) from Russian banks in 2013-2014. Given that President Dodon has built his entire election campaign on demonstrating close relations with the Kremlin and personally with President Vladimir Putin, it is clear that everyone assumed that this was done to increase Dodon's chances of win. However, there is another Moldovan politician with close connections with Moscow, who is also running for the parliament — Ilan Shor. It turns out that he was also interested in support through the above criminal case. There are also rumours connecting him with Plahotniuc, as mentioned above.

Many observers have an impression that the main competitors have turned themselves against each other so much that they have in advance excluded the possibility of peaceful discussion of any coalition agreements.

Broken Euro-integration Dreams

Since 2009, when the Communist Party of Moldova ceded power to the Alliance for European Integration (including Democratic Party of Moldova), the rapprochement with the EU has been going rapidly.

In 2009, Moldova joined the Eastern Partnership. From April 2014, Moldovan citizens could enter the Schengen zone without visas. In June 2014, Moldova signed an association agreement with the EU, thereby committing itself to reform its domestic policy in accordance with EU standards. In return, Moldova received multilateral, including financial, support from the EU.

Brussels did not hide the fact that it was trying to make Moldova a "showcase of European integration" for the Eastern Partnership, and therefore financially supported the reforms carried out in the country. However, in 2015, Moldova's relations with the EU began to deteriorate, to the extent that the European Union suspended funding for majority of projects in Moldova, including by ending the macro-financial support. In 2018, the European Parliament adopted a resolution on Moldova calling the country "a state captured by oligarchic interests."

Main accusations are against Vladimir Plahotniuc, who allegedly "has privatised the country", having influence on all branches of government. It is claimed that he also controls the prosecutor's office, special services and the Constitutional Court.

Being without popular support (his anti-rating, according to public opinion polls, is 75%), the leader of PDM does not hesitate attracting supporters through bribing and blackmail. For example, during the parliamentary elections of 2014, PDM won only 19 seats, but four years later, it already had a parliamentary majority of 57 seats thanks to independent deputies and defectors from other parties that joined PDM. One of the Communist deputies publicly claimed that she was offered a bribe for switching to the PDM. In case of failure, PDM was ready to use compromising materials.

Plahotniuc is credited with the initiative of changing the parliamentary election system to mixed, so that his party would be easier to gain a majority in parliament. In general, the plan partially worked out - according to party lists, PDM received 13 seats, and 17 seats through single-mandate lists. This is not enough to have a majority, but it is quite enough to negotiate with other elected representatives.

"PDM is ready to begin negotiations with parties and independent candidates to form a parliamentary majority and appoint the government. We want to have the first talks take place in the coming days, and we hope that they will become as productive as possible," Plahotniuc said on February 25 before the counting of votes ended.

Simple principle

The turnout in recent parliamentary elections in Moldova was 49.2%. This is the lowest turnout in the modern history of Moldova.

Moldavian sociologists believe that the citizens have lost faith in the political class. If earlier the elections were more sincere, now the voters cast their votes based on the principle of choosing the lesser of two evils.

Apparently, the OSCE observers also issued their verdict on the same principle. They recognised the parliamentary elections as correct, calling on the leaders of the Moldovan parties to stop opposing each other and sit down at the negotiating table.

The results of the parliamentary elections will be confirmed by mid-March. But there is a likelihood of parliamentary alliances.