Moldovan Action and Solidarity Party severely criticizes Democrats' initiative on switching to uninominal voting system

Chisinau, 6 March /MOLDPRES/ - The leader of the Action and Solidarity Party (PAS), Maia Sandu, today severely criticized the initiative by the Democratic Party (PDM) on the switch to the uninominal voting system.    

At a news conference, the PAS leader said the new electoral system would not ensure the citizens’ control over the MPs elected. “Corruption of the lawmakers elected in the uninominal electoral districts will take place by introducing the uninominal voting system. Thus, they will be prompted to join PDM. The fact that the people will be able to withdraw the mandated of the MP elected is a lie; who will decide whether the lawmaker worked well or not? Do you, the PDM members, want to subordinate all MPs by blackmail and manipulation? The Democrats’ leader also says that the citizens will elect the lawmakers by themselves; yet, he does not say that the MP elected in a district will not be able to do anything in parliament by him-/herself. For instance, to do something for the Calarasi district, the lawmaker will need at least 50 votes of the parliamentarians, who will be willing the same funds for their districts,” Maia Sandu said.          

The PAS leader also criticized an initiative, according to which the Diaspora citizens will be represented by lawmakers in the Moldovan parliament. “Under the draft from 2013, only three mandates are seen for the Diaspora and one vote of the Diaspora citizens would be five-fold less worth than one vote given by the citizens from Moldova. Do you think that the citizens who have been backing the country’s economy in all these years would deserve to be underrepresented in parliament? Also, how are you going to control the electoral process in the Transnistrian region and how the MPs elected in this region will represent the interests of the voters practically and whose rights will they defend, the ones of the Moldovans or of the breakaway groups? You will use this system to designate electoral districts, so that, regardless of the people’s vote, the man suiting you should win in a certain electoral district,” Maia Sandu also said.    

The Democrats’ leader, Vlad Plahotniuc, today said that PDM would initiate the process of switch to the uninominal voting system. According to him, the new uninominal system will ensure “citizens’ control over the politician,” will allow citizens to elect “people, not party lists,” and each district will have representatives in parliament, elected just from the local communities. “We will submit this legislative initiative to parliament on the days to come. The document will be adopted in parliament in final reading only after getting approval by the Venice Commission and after we hold public consultations, including with the civil society and the parliamentary and extra-parliamentary parties,” Plahotniuc said at a news briefing.     

The uninominal voting system is a type of electoral system provided for in the legislation of electoral systems, practices in the USA and the United Kingdom. This type of electoral system represent the way of direct election of individual candidates, opposed to the system of election on lists compiled by parties in the political life of a state.  

(Reporter A. Plitoc, editor L. Alcaza)