​CHISINAU, BALTI AND 5 MORE MOLDOVAN POPULATED AREAS TO HOLD SNAP MAYORAL ELECTIONS SUNDAY

On May 20, early mayoral elections will be held in the Moldovan capital, in the country’s second-largest city of Balti and in 5 more localities – the villages of Leuseni and Nemteni in the Hincesti Raion, Volovita (Soroca Raion), Jora de Mijloc (Orhei), and in Pirlita village (Ungheni Raion). Polling stations everywhere will open at 7am to work until 9pm.

The distribution of ballot-papers among the locality election boards began today and will be completed on Saturday, May 19. The election campaign will be finished at the Friday/Saturday midnight. On Saturday, no canvassing or propaganda shall be permitted because this will be the law-stipulated “silence day” on the election eve.

The Central Election Commission has reported that Chisinau citizens will be invited to 306 polling stations to be opened in the city, and Balti residents – to 58.

For holding the elections in the 7 populated areas, the CEC has printed a total of 752,460 ballots, including 474,816 – in Romanian and the rest in the Russian language. Namely, for Chisinau – 634,547 papers (including 408,080 in Romanian) and for Balti – 105,272 (including 54,398 in Romanian).

The cost of printing the ballot-papers was 0.28 leu a copy for Chisinau and 0.24 leu for Balti, where the list of candidates is shorter and, accordingly, a little cheaper.

According to the State Voter Register data as of March 31, 2018, the Republic of Moldova is home to 3,259,025 voters, which figure is approximately 4 thousand smaller than was a year before. In Chisinau, there are now 632,450 voters, or 15 thousand less than 12 months ago, and in Balti – 105 thousand voters, or minus 5 hundred.

The Chisinau Mayor’s post is being contested by 11 candidates, whose names are standing in ballot-papers as follows:

Vasile Costiuc – of the Democratia Acasa [DA, Democracy at Home] party;
Andrei Nastase – of the political party called Platform “Demnitate si Adevar” [DA, “Dignity and Justice”];
Alexandru Rosco – Our Home is Moldova (OHM) party;
Valeriu Munteanu – the Liberal Party;
Ion Ceban – the Party of Socialists;
Victor Stratila – the Green Ecologic Party;
Maxim Braila – the Moldovan People’s Party;
Alexandra Can – the National Liberal Party;
Silvia Radu – independent candidate;
Alexandru Mitu – the Russian Slavic Party; and
Constantin Codreanu – the National Unity Party (PUN) of Moldova.

Candidate Regina Apostolova has been de-registered from the list of candidates for violating the legal norm that prohibits the financing of election campaigns from abroad.

And in Balti, the Central Election Commission has registered 8 candidates:

Arina Spataru of the DA Platform;
Alexander Usatii of the Party of Socialists;
Nicolai Grigorishin of Our Party (OP);
Sergiu Burlacu of the National Unity Party (PUN);
Pavel Verejan of Ilan Shor Party;
Simion Gutu of the Party of Action and Solidarity (PAS);
Oleg Topolnitsky of the Russian Slavic Party; and
Elena Gritco – an independent candidate.

According to the Moldovan legislation, an election is considered valid at a voter turnout of 25% registered voters. If no candidate polls 50% +1 vote on May 20, the republic will hold a second round of elections two weeks later, on June 3, to be contested by 2 finalists who will win the most in the first round.

The Government has allocated a total of 22.5 million lei from the State Budget for both rounds.

have to prove that we are dignified and we do not want to be ruled by thieves”, stated Sandu.