Non-commercial organizations to be able to provide onerous services to electoral contenders

Chisinau, 24 November /MOLDPRES/ - The cabinet of ministers today approved the amendment of the Article 6/(5)from the Law No 86/2020 on non-commercial organization, so that, on the period of electoral campaigns, the non-commercial organizations are banned only from providing free of charge services, not also onerous services. The decision is meant to adjust the normative framework to the Constitutional Court’s (CCM) Decision No 24/2020, the government’s communication and protocol department has reported.    

The present version of the aforementioned article reads that ‘’ on the period of the electoral campaign, the non-commercial organization cannot provide services and/or supports materially or free of charge electoral contenders and cannot make electoral agitation.’’    

CCM recognized the constitutional character of the concerned text, to the extent to which the non-commercial organizations are allowed to provide onerous services for electoral contenders on the period of the electoral campaign. To reach this conclusion, the Court found out the existence of a difference of treatment between the non-commercial and commercial organizations, with the ban on to provide onerous services on the period of the electoral campaign existing only as regards the non-commercial organizations.  

Thus, the Constitutional Court concluded that the prohibition to provide onerous services to electoral contenders on the period of the electoral campaign limits, in an unjustified and in discriminatory way, the title of the non-commercial organizations, contrary to the articles 16 and 46 of the Constitution.      

In this respect, the government suggests the replacing of the text ‘’services and/or supports materially or free of charge’’ by the text ‘’free of charge services and/or materially supports.’’  

Photo: Government