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The U.S. Senate has delivered a Resolution to the Moldovan Government, bitterly criticising Chisinau and recommending it to ensure democratic and fair elections on April 5. The document notes that the March 2005 elections were declared as “partly free, but unfair” and the electoral campaign for the 2009 parliamentary elections “was affected” by many irregularities signalled by the International Observation Commission, including the OSCE. It stresses that the U.S. recognises the development and establishment in Moldova of a democratic political system as a precondition for the assumption by Moldova of its rightful place as a full and equal member of the Western community of democracies. (Source: Unimedia)

The Social Democratic Party (PSD) has presented dossiers of 250,000 electors who have plans to vote the PSD at the April 5 elections. “We have more than 250,000 electors who were not afraid to put down their names on the list of PSD supporters,” Ion Banari stated. He noted that thus the PSD knows its electors and will take care that these voters come to polling stations and elect the PSD. According to PSD chairman Dumitru Braghis, the votes collected on these lists will rank the party on the 4th or 5th place in the future Parliament. As well, Braghis asked Moldovan President Vladimir Voronin to use his quality of guarantor of the Constitution and prevent the election fraud. (Source: Info-Prim)

“The Actiunea Europeana (European Action) Movement (MAE) is the guarantee of the anti-corruption fight in Moldova,” MAE chairman Anatol Petrencu has told a press conference. MAE released its resolutions adopted on the eve of elections, promising as follows: it will not cooperate at all with the Party of Communists, the Christian Democratic People’s Party and the Centrist Union of Moldova; will make a post-electoral coalition only with parties which join the National Anti-Corruption Pact; MAE parliamentarians will not vote laws which aim at personal interests and run counter to the citizens’ benefit; will not accept any bribe; will arrest the corrupts in Moldova after investigating fraudulent privatisations and thefts of public funds. (Source: Info-Prim)

The Liberal Democratic Party of Moldova (PLDM) released Friday, April 3 the 1st volume of the “Communism File” which includes analyses, researches, investigations, articles, reports on abuses committed by the communist governing and its acolytes in 2001–2008. The file has 765 pages and provides detailed and argued illegalities committed by Voronin’s regime in the area of human rights; actions against domestic economy, entrepreneurs, business dispossession; illicit privatisations, use of administrative resources of the country, embezzlements of funds and budgets, grave foreign policy errors, actions obstructing and manipulating the media etc. (Source: PLDM press release)

“The incumbent governing, which is in charge with quality of democratic standards and quality of exercising of people’s will, calls for the compliance of these elections with the highest international and national standards,” the head of the “Election 2009” Centre of the Party of Communists of the Republic of Moldova (PCRM), Mark Tkaciuk, has stated to OMEGA Agency. He noted that the ruling party wishes that after a civilised electoral campaign “any elector, both the winner and the loser to draw right conclusions from the voting and not to wonder about the election mechanism, but to be confident that his/her ballot was not stolen.” (Source: Omega portal)

The deputy chairman of the Democratic Party (PDM), Oazu Nantoi, has presented a pile of ballot papers and explained election tricking techniques used on March 6, 2005. He told journalists that he has got the ballot papers from a former PCRM activist from Orhei. According to Nantoi, the former activist was member of an electoral bureau of a polling station in 2005 and received ballot papers from the PCRM on which the “voted” stamp was set in line with the PCRM, while the stamp of the office of polling station was set on the other side. Nantoi feared that PCRM members of electoral offices may introduce ballot papers delivered by the PCRM instead of the unwanted ballot papers when they will be counted. The PDM finds here an explanation why 146,000 people were added to voter rolls, compared with the number of electors at last elections. PDM leader Dumitru Diacov invited observers and electors to be vigilant in the voting process. (Source: Info-Prim)

The TV stations N4 and EuTV have repeatedly violated the election coverage regulations, besides the fact that along with NIT and Moldova-1, it kept treating unfairly political players involved in electoral process. These are the findings of the 4th monitoring report on presence of political players in TV programmes, worked out by the Electronic Press Association of Moldova (APEL) during March 18–24, 2009. According to the APEL report, quantity data on monitoring of news programmes in the 7th electoral week reveal that NIT, N4 and Moldova-1 continued to be the messengers of the PCRM, while Eu TV kept promoting the PPCD. At the same time, Pro TV, TV7 and TVC21 reconfirmed their previous practice of fair coverage of electoral competitors. (Source: Info-Prim)

Moldovan citizens from the Transnistrian region are discriminated in terms of exercising their electoral right, inclusively by electoral authorities of Moldova. This is the conclusion of the second report on monitoring the electoral process in Transnistrian region of Moldova at the 2009 parliamentary elections released by the Promo-Lex Association. The Central Electoral Commission (CEC) has disseminated just 14,500 ballot papers to 10 polling stations from the region while accounts of the Ministry of Information Development indicate that there are 223,580 Moldovan citizens entitled to vote in Transnistria. CEC made this decision because about 8,000 people attended the 2005 parliamentary elections. Promo-Lex chairman Ion Manole said that the worst situation is observed in Corjova, the rayon of Dubasari, as with two days before elections the polling stations there lacks the necessary inventory and ballot boxes are sequestered so far by the customs station near the village of Pohrebea, the rayon of Dubasari. Militiamen in uniforms patrol the locality and residents are threatened that they will face graver clashes than in June 2007, should they participate in elections. (Source: Info-Prim)

The Central Electoral Commission (CEC) has made the totals of activities it held to conduct the parliamentary elections. CEC chairman Eugeniu Stirbu said that during current campaign CEC approved all revised normative acts of the commission after the Parliament has modified the Election Code. According to Stirbu, 15 parties and 6 independent candidates were registered to run for elections, but two (i.e. three) parties and an independent candidate left the competition later. The stamp “Withdrawn” will be applied in line with these electoral candidates in ballot papers. Overall, 1,236 candidates will run for the Sunday elections on party lists, including 325 women, 55 members to the Parliament and 208 persons who hold a foreign citizenship or applied in this respect. As many as 1,978 polling stations were opened for the parliamentary elections, inclusively 33 in other countries and 10 for citizens from Transnistria. As many as 2,598,875 people were included in voter rolls after a checking. (Source: Moldpres)

The media watchdog CCA turned down Friday, April 3 some applications submitted by the “Moldova Noastra” Alliance (AMN) vs. TV stations Moldova-1, NIT and N4. AMN claims that these stations have violated Article 47 of the Election Code concerning electoral propaganda and Article 17 of the election coverage regulation adopted by the Central Electoral Commission (CEC), which prohibits dignitaries to deliver statements on their activity during the electoral campaign. AMN argues that Moldova-1, N4 and NIT would have aired programmes featuring the chief of state and high-ranking governmental dignitaries at openings of cultural facilities and inauguration of economic entities. CCA member Valeriu Soltan said that state dignitaries did not deliver statements and interviews in the contested programmes, while a Moldova-1 representative explained that President Voronin appears in those programmes in his quality of chief of state, not electoral candidate. Finally, majority of CCA members turned down the AMN applications. CCA member Ludmila Vasilache sought Friday the sanctioning of the TV station NIT for having aired a tricked report about the Liberal Democratic Party, but she was the only CCA member who voted for this initiative. (Source: Info-Prim)

The Central Electoral Commission (CEC) has introduced an information system to collect and provide data from all electoral bureaus, in order to facilitate the public access to results of the April 5 elections. “The system will provide data on development of electoral process, turnout at every polling station, as well as regarding results of elections that means the number of ballot papers won by every electoral candidate per polling station. The results will be released by the end of the Election Day. At the same time, statistics on number of ballot papers received by each polling station, number of voters included in supplementary rolls will be available,” said Vsevolod Valihmetov, manager of the company which elaborated the information system for elections. In this context, CEC secretary Iurie Ciocan stressed that the system has an information purpose only. He noted that the final legal results will be learned just after the submission of all reports and ballot papers to CEC the next 48 hours after the electoral process. (Source: Omega portal)

The Liberal Party (PL) has called upon electors to participate actively in the parliamentary elections on April 5, 2009 “for the benefit of our and our children’s future” and make “a wise and right choice.” The PL invited people not to vote for the Party of Communists and choose the “long-expected change”. The party is confident that the future governing “will ensure the internal political stability, a peaceful resolution of the Transnistrian problem, a coherent enforcement of European values and standards capable to speed up Moldova’s accession to the European Union, building of reciprocally advantageous partnerships with Romania and Ukraine and pragmatic and fair relations with the Russian Federation.” (Source: PL Appeal)

The European Union signals problems related to the conduct of electoral process in Moldova on the eve of the April 5 parliamentary elections. According to a statement released in Vienna within a sitting of the OSCE Permanent Council, there are “negative aspects such as abusive use of administrative resources, problems related to contents of voter rolls and biased media coverage in favour of the ruling majority.” The EU considers that “holding the parliamentary elections on April 5 in a democratic manner has a special importance.” It notes that the pace and quality of reforms which Moldova has committed itself to implement “influence the relations of this state with the EU.” (Source: Infotag)

The Labour Union “Patria-Rodina” (Homeland) (UMPR) has withdrawn from electoral competition in favour of the “Moldova Noastra” Alliance (AMN), UMPR leader Gheorghe Sima told a press conference on April 3. Sima said that the UMPR did not negotiate at all its withdrawal with the AMN and did not discuss a possible cooperation between the two parties with AMN leaders. We have withdrawn from electoral race because we regard the AMN as the No.1 opposition party capable to take over the rule in Moldova, Sima assured. In his turn, AMN spokesman Victor Osipov stated to DECA-press that the decision of UMPR was a positive surprise, and confirmed that the two parties did not discuss any further cooperation. (Source: Deca-press)

Chisinau central authorities and Tiraspol regional authorities must discuss in order to agree on actions aimed to allow Moldovan citizens from the village of Corjova to exercise their electoral right, the special coordinator of the OSCE chairman-in office, Petros Efthymiou, and the head of the OSCE Mission to Moldova, Philip Remler, said on Thursday, April 2. “We keep calling upon both parties to reach a reciprocal agreement capable to allow electors from Corjova to freely exercise their electoral right at the Moldovan parliamentary elections this Sunday,” Efthymiou and Remler said in a joint statement. “We call upon them to avoid incidents capable to produce consequences beyond the electoral process as well,” they noted. The OSCE Mission to Moldova is ready to monitor should the sides reach an agreement. “However, the monitoring does not guarantee the security. Both sides are responsible to make common steps in order to prevent incidents,” Remler and Efthymiou added. (Source: Info-Prim)

Gagauz Bashkan Mihail Formuzal believes that only three parties have chances to be voted in the region on April 5. He told a press conference on Thursday that the Centrist Union of Moldova (UCM) will win most of votes in the region. The Bashkan estimated that between 55,000 and 60,000 residents of Gagauzia will participate in elections. “It is unclear so far what happens with voter rolls. There were 80,000–90,000 people on voter rolls last week and there are 105,000 electors at present,” Formuzal stressed. He denied rumours that he would support the Party of Communists. “Some media outlets release such reports and mislead the electors,” he added. (Source: Infotag)

The Centrist Union of Moldova (UCM) and the Party of Regions (PR) of Ukraine have signed an action plan on building a free economic enterprise in the southern area of Moldova. A statement in this regard was delivered by UCM leader Vasile Tarlev at a press conference on Thursday. He believes that the southern area of the country is favourable for such a project because it is close to the Odessa region which has a very developed infrastructure. The deputy chairman of the Union of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs from Ukraine (UAID), Sergei Prokhorov, said that a state support is needed to develop cooperation projects between Moldova and Ukraine and electors shall make a right choice at the forthcoming elections for this purpose. He awarded the Golden Symbol of the Union to Tarlev for special success in developing economic relations between Moldova and Ukraine. (Source: Infotag)