Rethink Moldova

EUobserver / [Comment] Rethink Moldova
BY STEFAN FUELE AND PHILIPPE LE HOUEROU
23.03.2010 @ 15:00 CET
EUOBSERVER / COMMENT - With an average yearly income of only €1,100, Moldovans have seen their country steadily grow in the past decade only to run into the headwinds of the global economic crisis.

The crisis has taken a toll on many countries in Europe but Moldova has suffered more than most. The country's output, which grew at 6 percent between 2004 and 2008, shrank by an estimated 6.5 percent last year. The country's poverty fight stalled and foreign investment was at risk of being reversed, while a lengthy electoral process and difficult political transition left the public finances in crisis and delayed the necessary reforms.

Chisinau - The average yearly income for Moldovans is €1,100 (Photo: Ministry of Culture and Tourism

Today, though, Moldova is coming back thanks to an ambitious reform programme. During the past eight months, a new government in Chisinau has moved decisively to tackle its political and economic legacies and lay the foundation for a more competitive economy and more transparent state. The country is also firmly anchored in the EU's Neighbourhood Policy and its regional platform, the Eastern Partnership.

The Moldova Partnership Forum, jointly hosted by the European Commission and World Bank, on 24 March 2010 in Brussels, aims to coordinate international assistance in support of Moldova's reform efforts.

Since October 2009, Moldova's economic reforms have been anchored on an economic stabilization and recovery programme. This programme has included difficult spending cuts and increased tariffs (including for energy and heating) but also significant increases in targeted social assistance to soften the effect on the poor, and efforts to improve the efficiency and quality of public spending. These fiscal measures have been flanked with an effort to deregulate and de-monopolize the economy and create new jobs.

Moldova has made further progress in reforming governance. The public administration is undergoing a review to reduce duplication of functions and lay the basis for the creation of a professional civil service. Public financial management is being upgraded and key elements of the system, including public procurement and internal and external audit are being reformed in line with European standards.

Moldova's crisis was precipitated by a difficult domestic political situation and the onset of the global economic and financial crisis. However, as in many other countries in the region, Moldova's vulnerability to external shocks was made worse by an economic growth model heavily reliant on remittance-financed domestic consumption.

Beyond managing the current crisis, the challenge for Moldova's leadership is to develop a new strategy of sustainable and more balanced economic growth. To do this, the government, supported by a multi-party coalition in parliament, has chosen integration and harmonization with the EU as the anchors for its strategy. The EU-Moldova Action Plan and Partnership and Cooperation Agreement (PCA), the Eastern Partnership and, when in place, the EU-Moldova Association Agreement, will help to guide these integration and harmonization efforts.

Moldova's leaders know that fulfilling the commitments under these programmes, e.g. reforming the justice sector, liberalizing the economy, fighting corruption, does not offer a short-cut to prosperity and they have demonstrated that through their early commitment to decisive reform actions. They have adeptly used the moment of crisis to launch a deep social, economic and governance reform process.

For their part, Moldova's international partners are supporting these efforts. The Moldova Partnership Forum taking place later this week in Brussels will ensure that the financial assistance available from International Financial Institutions as well as Moldova's multilateral and bilateral partners will be aligned with the government's reform programme. New donors such as China and Russia have also been invited.

Such broad support should be a reassurance and an incentive to deliver. A sustained reform effort will allow Moldova to steadily close the gap between the standard of living of its citizens and those of its European neighbours. The authorities in Chisinau need international support to move ahead with their ambitious reform plans.

The writers are, respectively, EU Commissioner for Enlargement and European Neighbourhood Policy and World Bank Vice-President for Europe and Central Asia.

President of Moldova Unveiled Evidence

By Irina Severin

Thursday 1^st April, 2010 (Chisinau, Moldova): Moldovan interim President Mihai Ghimpu convened a news conference where he presented video images, appearing to prove Valeru Boboc, 23, was killed by the police following youth riots in Chisinau.

Two week ago ex-president of Moldova and communist party leader, Vladimir Voronin stated during a talk-show, that Boboc had been thrown  from a window of the Parliament building’s 3rd floor by unknown persons. 

The video images were recorded by two cameras, used to observe the scene, and located on  the Government building’s roof and at ground level.  Video clearly shows that Boboc was thrown to the ground and beaten to death by up to 20 men- in police uniform and in plain-clothes.   

The assault, recorded by the cameras, was slightly longer than 10 minutes.  The body of Boboc was removed from the square by a Lada “NIVA” car.  The assailants then left the square in an organized manner. Some of them went to the Government building others  headed  in the direction of Parliament  

During this period most of the heads of the police force were present. This gives some reason to suppose  that they received a centralized  order from higher ups; and that the action was organized and coordinated.

The Mayor of Chisinau ,Dorin Chirtoaca, who assisted President Ghimpu during the news conference, described the action, shown  on video,  as “an (act) of terror against those who were unhappy with the communists winning of the elections and the prospect of a communist future for the country”.

The president stated at the news conference that he received the video one day earlier and with the help of specialists identified some of those who were present at the square. He said that he felt obliged to present the video to the people.

The head of the Parliamentary Commission for the investigation of the events of the 7 April, Vitalie Nogachevski, confirmed that the commission possesses the same video. He considers that the discloser of this evidence will be detrimental to the investigation underway and lead by the Prosecutor’s Office.   President Ghimpu, who unveiled the evidence, said that much more damaging for society is the fact that, after an entire year of investigation, people still don’t know the truth and the  people,  commited the crime, continue to serve in the state police. 

Earlier Nogachevski insisted that all evidence in the 7^th April case was hidden or destroyed by the communists before they left the office.  Concerning the instigators of the disorders, he said that  Moldova doesn't have the necessary equipment which would allow the  identification of the instigators of the riots.  Two days earlier he announced that the commission won’t present a public report on the 7^th April’s events, on which it worked for several months. The public hearings of the report were planned for the 31 March.

Does Tea Party Obscure a New 'Silent Majority'? - AOL News

Does Tea Party Obscure a New 'Silent Majority'? - AOL News

Does Tea Party Obscure a New 'Silent Majority'?

Updated: 2 hours 40 minutes ago

Print Text Size

E-mail More

Andrea StoneSenior Washington Correspondent

WASHINGTON (March 31) -- Do Democrats need a new "silent majority" to speak up and save them from electoral ruin in November? Does such a group even exist? And, if it does, will the tea party movement prove to be the right-wing mirror of the leftist anti-war movement of the 1960s?

These are not idle questions for President Barack Obama, who has seen little bounce from his party's victory in passing health care reform legislation.

"The good news for Democrats, after health care passed, was that Democratic intensity levels went up," party strategist James Carville told reporters Wednesday. The bad news, he said, was that they don't nearly approach the enthusiasm levels among Republicans riled up and angry over what they see as deficit-ridden big government. If that continues until November, he said, "that doesn't bode well for Democrats" and their current edge in Congress.

Robyn Beck, AFP / Getty Images

Tea party activists protest in Searchlight, Nev., the hometown of Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, last weekend.

Tea party protests have dominated cable TV since last summer's raucous town hall meetings on health care. Hundreds stood outside the Capitol last week to protest the legislation in the final hours before its passage.

Only a few dozen counterprotesters showed up to challenge them. Ryan Rutledge, 20, a member of College Democrats at the University of Wisconsin at Stevens Point, was among them. As he and other students chanted, "We've got the votes," they were drowned out by tea partyers singing, "Nah nah nah nah, hey hey hey, goodbye."

"People need to be more active" in support of Obama's policies, Rutledge said. Why weren't more supporters out carrying "For Health Care Reform" signs? "Most Democrats have jobs. These people are mostly retired and already have health insurance," he said, motioning to the crowd that also included unemployed demonstrators.

Tea party activists have called their gatherings conservative versions of Woodstock, but that analogy cuts two ways. While a recent Rasmussen poll revealed 53 percent approval for tea party positions, another by Bloomberg showed that just 26 percent identified themselves with those views -- however outspoken about them they may be.

And that, say some analysts, makes the tea party like the 1960s anti-war movement.

Both were "very intense, very vocal, very loud," Charles Franklin, a political polling expert at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, told AOL News. "You could plausibly make the parallel claim that it's the right that is in the minority [now] but is visible and loud and frankly driving the conversation, the coverage, in the same way that the anti-war protesters did."

President Richard Nixon countered the left-leaning protesters by coining the term "silent majority" to describe those Americans who supported his policy in Vietnam in a November 1969 speech. Nixon said he would not be dictated by a "minority" of anti-war protesters "mounting demonstrations in the street."

The Republican president would later win a landslide victory over George McGovern in 1972, discrediting the Democrat's anti-war platform by winning 49 of 50 states for re-election.

"Nixon was right -- there was a silent majority and ultimately those voices were heard," Darrell West, vice president of governance studies at the Brookings Institution, told AOL News. "The lesson to be learned is that the noisiest people aren't always the most numerous. They attract a lot of media attention, but they may not be representative of the public at large."

At a time when President Obama's job approval rating is split evenly among supporters and detractors, Democrats may take solace in the lessons of history. True, recent elections inMassachusetts and earlier in Virginia and New Jersey were big blows. But if there is a left-leaning "silent majority" waiting in the wings, the events of the next few months could help them find their voice.

"As the right becomes radicalized, they risk alienating the center," Democratic strategist Paul Begala told AOL News. "The fringe anti-war extremists in the '60s discredited the left and legitimate liberalization for a generation."

Whether extremists on the right will do the same to the tea party remains to be seen. More relevant for congressional elections this fall, Begala said, "Is there an Obama movement or was there just an Obama moment?"

Democrats like Carville acknowledge that the thrill of those "Yes We Can" days is gone. Analysts say that's to be expected.

"When you've won, you then sit back and wait for your guys to govern," said Cal Jillson, a Southern Methodist University political scientist.

"It's easier to generate intensity in opposition than in support," West said. "Democratic activists have been complacent. ... They should realize that if they don't express their views, their voices won't be heard" in November.

Franklin agreed: "A silent majority that stays home and sits on its hands can help convert a loud minority into a winning voting coalition."

University of Virginia political scientist Larry Sabato said he isn't sure there is a left-leaning silent majority, but he is convinced that most of the 53 percent of voters who chose Obama in 2008 are still with him politically. He also said that the "vast majority" of opposition to Democratic policies comes from the minority 46 percent who voted for Republican John McCain.

"I don't think Obama's coalition is silent at all," he said, noting that many on the left grumbled loudly that he caved to moderates by dropping a public health insurance option and on Wednesday were none too pleased over his expansion of offshore oil drilling. "They were as loud and assertive in '08 as the tea party crowd is today. By 2012, they'll be back in the public forum."

Republican message guru Frank Luntz isn't so sure. "There was a vocal majority that had had enough of [George W.] Bush and [Dick] Cheney and Republicans," he told AOL News. "But now they see this change and they don't like what they see. This is not change they can believe in. It's too radical for them, too government-centered."

Luntz said there are many who want Obama to do well, though. "There is a silent majority that still hopes he succeeds. They connect America's success with his," he said. "They just wish he didn't support what he supports."

Filed under: Nation, Politics

Follow us on Facebook and Twitter.

2010 AOL Inc. All Rights Reserved.

Гимпу: «Здесь пахнет коммунизмом»

pan.md - Гимпу: «Здесь пахнет коммунизмом»

И.о. президента не смог договориться с фракцией ПКРМ

Во вторник, на встречу с и.о. президента, председателем Либеральной партии Михаем Гимпу собралась почти вся парламентская фракция Партии коммунистов. Не было лишь председателя ПКРМ, экс-президента Молдовы Владимира Воронина.

И.о президента опоздал почти на 10 минут. Однако, фракция ПКРМ почти в полном составе (кроме председателя Владимира Воронина) ждала его на втором этаже Дворца республики.

К гостю и журналистам обратилась лидер фракции Марии Постойко. Она напомнила, что коммунисты требуют скорейшего роспуска парламента и назначения даты новых выборов. После, от имени фракции слово взял один из старейших членов ПКРМ, депутат Вадим Мишин, который также потребовал от Гимпу объявления даты роспуска парламента и назначения новых парламентских выборов.

И.о. президента согласился, что высший законодательный орган страны распускать нужно . Однако, по мнению Гимпу, это уместно сделать лишь после внесения парламентом поправок в статью 78 Конституции Молдовы. И.о. президента считает, что на это потребуется 6-7 месяцев. Сначала необходимо передать проект поправки на рассмотрение Конституционному суду, а после одобрить нынешним составом парламента.

«Но для внесения поправок прошу вернуться на пленарные заседания парламента»,- позвал Гимпу коммунистов. В свою очередь, депутаты фракции ПКРМ ультимативно потребовали не увиливать от выборов и дать конкретные ответы: когда и.о. президента соизволит распустить парламент и назначить дату новых парламентских выборов.

Вадим Мишин заявил, что пока Конституционный суд выскажется по поправке 78-й статьи Конституции, можно будет распустить парламент, провести выборы и уже следующим составом законодательного органа проголосовать за изменение Конституции. Соответственно, и президента выбрать по новым правилам.

Уговорить Гимпу на объявление даты роспуска парламента попытались также депутаты Григорий Петренко и Игорь Додон. Последний напомнил Гимпу, что 31 марта – последний день ультиматума ПКРМ о перемирии. И промедление Гимпу с ответом может только привести к большей эскалации политического конфликта.

«Помягче, пожалуйста, помягче. Не учите меня, что я должен говорить. Если мне Петренко продолжит читать лекции, закрывать рот, я скажу "До свидания". Я пришел сюда, чтобы добиться консенсуса, а не носиться с додонами и бидонами под столом», - не давал себя в обиду либерал.

В дискуссию включился депутат от ПКРМ Василий Шова. Он потребовал внести в повестку дня следующего пленарного заседания парламента обсуждение рекомендаций Венецианской комиссии. Однако, Гимпу уточнил, что в этих рекомендациях не говорится о необходимости срочного роспуска парламента.

«В общем, приходите на заседание парламента - там все обсудим»,- еще раз предложил Гимпу и распрощался с оппонентами, которые пообещали подумать, есть ли смысл приходить на заседания.

После попыток журналистов получить у и.о. президента мнение о встрече с коммунистами, Гимпу предложил выйти из помещения. «Идем на свежий воздух, а то здесь пахнет коммунизмом»,- сказал он.

На улице либерала Гимпу догнал коммунист Мишин. Обменявшись репликами о необходимости роспуска парламента, депутаты еще минут 15 спорили о служебных машинах, которые Гимпу запретил давать коммунистам.

«Перестаньте прогуливать заседания и тогда сможете пользоваться авто. Кто не работает, тот не ездит»,-- ответил Гимпу. И в знак демонстрации того, что либералы тоже могут ходить пешком, прогулялся в окружении телекамер через центральный парк.

Игнат Валиков
mail@pan.md

Filat: Early elections in 6 months or a year - Society - Jurnal.md

Filat: Early elections in 6 months or a year - Society - Jurnal.md

Filat: Early elections in 6 months or a year

source: jurnal.md photo: gov.md 1088

“I’m not one of those who wish early elections, but we govern by the law and not according to our personal wishes. Our foreign partners don’t understand how early elections can be avoided and consider the scrutiny a democratic act. If we want to maintain their support, we’ll have to obey the law. Early elections will take place in 6 months or even a year” Prime Minister Vlad Filat stated during a meeting with “Parlamentul 90” association. According to Filat, his government has achieved a lot over the last six moths and will do likewise in the same period until the elections. “Perhaps the 2 billion euro, 52% of which are grants, are not as important as the friendship and openness of our foreign partners. Nobody will condemn us if we avoid elections, but we’ll risk their friendship” Filat told to “Parlamentul 90” members, who were against early elections. The PM stressed that through attracting the 2 billion euro support and starting the negotiation regarding free enhanced trade with EU, “Moldova will get on another orbit”. “It will not matter who comes to power because this new dimension will set the task of implementing reforms for people to live better.” “Parlamentul 90” members came up with some proposals such as adopting a law regarding the celebration of the national flag, in remembrance of April 27th 1990, when the tricolor was carried on the Parliament building. Besides, they ask public employees that cause people more trouble that help to be dismissed. The association insists all those guilty of corruption should be truly punished because usually the prosecution is never finished. Ex-general prosecutor between 1990 and 1998 Dumitru Postovan suggested that each state institution should be monitored by a member of the association. “You’ll see that there is no need in so many control organs. We’ll do fine and unveil those who break rules or admit such things.” Filat stressed that this advice was useful for the government and wants to further organize such periodical meetings. “I’ve noted the proposal about the National Flag Day. By the way, on August 27th we should celebrate the Independence Day of the Republic of Moldova, unlike the communists did” he stated.