Employees of radio, TV station from Gagauzia go on strike given appointment of new Observers' Council

Chisinau, 11 April /MOLDPRES/ - Employees of the public radio and TV station from the Autonomous Territorial Unit (UTA) Gagauz-Yeri (GRT) today informed that they suspended work, given a decision by the autonomy’s People’s Assembly (APG, local Gagauzian parliament), under which a new composition of GRT’s Observers’ Council was appointed.    

“Starting from today, we go on strike, and if necessary, we will go on hunger strike, unless the People’s Assembly cancel the decision on appointment of the new Observers’ Council,” the acting executive director of the public radio and TV station from UTA Gagauz-Yeri, Piotr Vlah, has said at a protest rally in Comrat (administrative centre of Gagauzia).     

The GRT employees describe APG’s ruling as “politicized by a certain party affiliation.”  

At a GRT’s meeting on 10 April, when the new speaker of the autonomy’s People’s Assembly, Vladimir Cîssa, came to introduce the new Observers’ Council, Vlah said that “the former composition of the structure is still in force, as the issue is presently considered in court.”   

For his part, APG speaker Vladimir Cîssa said that, for the time being, the court had not suspended the powers of the People’s Assembly to elect a new Observers’ Council. “We are obliged to fulfill the decision by APG. A contest was announced, all candidates are subjected to legal procedures and had access to the session when the voting too place,” Cîssa stressed, cited by the webpage www.gagauzinfo.md .    

At the end of the 10 April meeting, Piotr Vlah said that “till the decision by the law court, two Observers’ Councils will act at GRT. Vlah noted that “a cooperation with the new Council will be possible only following the decision by the court, which must establish the lawfulness of the suspension of the present council’s work.”    

(Reporter L. Grubii, editor L. Alcaza)