EVALUATION OF GENERAL REGULATION FRAMEWORK OF POLITICAL PARTIES IN THE

REPUBLIC OF MOLDOVA

Sociological study

KNOWN TERMS AND PRACTICES - I

• an intermediary group between society and power

• party is an exponent of a segment from society

• a political party is a group of persons united by common visions on organization of society, political regime and are determined to fight for achievement of their purposes

KNOWN TERMS AND PRACTICES - II

• Political party is a free reunion of citizens having as political purposes to manage public affairs

• We in Republic of Moldova … actually… do not have political parties...! We have support groups of certain political personalities,… that fight for power…!

• A group of persons aiming to ”gluttonize” power … lead by a Führer „with a bag of money” – A Führer, a party, a bag of money”

REGISTRATION LEGAL PROCEDURES - I

• Registration conditions of a political party are rather bureaucratized and formal

• Existing registration conditions prohibit development of local parties

• Registration conditions have to be as simple as possible, electorate is the one that decides on who is going to survive as a party or not

REGISTRATION LEGAL PROCEDURES - II

• ...If we come back to the number ... There are several studies saying that in different countries ... there are mass parties and staff parties. If we refer to mass parties, then it is rather clear that 400 members is normal, but if we refer to staff parties, then I think 200 would constitute maximum number of members, in some countries there is an even smaller specified number.

PARTIES AS ORGANIZATIONS. INTERNAL DEMOCRACY- I

• Analysis of debates allows us to conclude that actual Political Parties are considered to be not very democratic, rather rigid and centralized

• Opinions have split regarding necessity of developing legal framework within enforcing from “outside” – by legislation the internal party “democratization” or by retreat of state from party internal life. An internal democracy is able to exist only where it is enforced by party members and not by legal provisions

PARTIES AS ORGANIZATIONS. INTERNAL DEMOCRACY- II

• … Democratic parties promote and stipulate in their charter … codes of conduct and prevention of conflict of interests. This would mean many prevented negative things…

Women in political parties and elections – divided opinions

• … I do not want equal chances, and not equal possibilities, but I want equal results!

• We plead for equality of chances, gender equality... Let’s plead for a favor that men would offer us?!!

Regulating Authority• …such an agency would never be independent...• ... In our country a centre for combating corruption cannot be

independent • … anyway within parties’ activity there has to be a financial control,

a control on abidance of legislation, which different institutions do. Or, that you delegate now, meaning the state has … to create an institution. To find funds in order to financially support this institution. Which in its turn would provide different specialists having capacities in financial, logistic etc. aspects to verify institution’s activity. Or it remains for the Ministry of Justice to verify its part, IRS – its part. It is more simple… for everything to remain as it is. … But in our country where you can exercise influence wherever you wish, by constituting an institution … it is rather easily influenced. It is exactly as during elections – who pays more, that one…

Funding of political parties • … Regarding external funding ... it is a rather complicated matter,

due to the fact that in some countries this is provided by legislation and I totally understand the reasons why our country’s legislation is so prohibitory on funding in this chapter, in countries with diaspora ... Such as Armenia or Israel, parties would vanish because of diaspora. We have also become a country with diaspora of one million citizens … A person who had left Moldova 10 years ago and who had received citizenship of another foreign country, do you think in this case can it be considered outside funding or not?

• Everyone is aware that funding from outside is performed, everyone knows that some political parties received funds from Tiraspol, and then, if we want to have our own political parties that have no entangled interests, it is necessary for the state to be more or less generous at the extent of 0.2 % and this would emphasize the possibility to perceive more clearly the funding flow, how are political parties funded, ... the issue on external funding has to be revised and specified once again.