After the second round of Sunday’s
\nlocal elections in Moldova, the pro-western parties retained control of the
\ncapital Chisinau, as well as their chances to form a new government coalition.<\/p>\n
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The incumbent pro-western mayor of
\nMoldova’s capital Chisinau, Dorin Chirtoaca won the run-off vote with more than
\n53% of the votes. The biggest city in Moldova, Chisinau is home to a third of
\nthis republic’s population and accounts for almost a half of its GDP. <\/p>\n
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According to the final results,
\nChirtoaca won comfortably against his socialist rival and former communist
\nprime minister Zinaida Greceanyi, who won 46% of the votes. Chirtoaca thanked
\nvoters and couldn’t help taking a jibe at the socialists, who, in recent years,
\nhave taken over from the communists the status of Moscow’s prot\u00e9g\u00e9s:<\/p>\n
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I would like to thank the people of
\nChisinau who came out and voted, all those who voted for me and to my rival for
\ntaking part in these elections, thus showing that the socialists’ and Kremlin’s
\nbravest man is today a woman.<\/p>\n
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The victory of the young Liberal
\npolitician and Bucharest-educated lawyer is a victory for the entire pro-European
\ncamp in the Republic of Moldova. At 36, Chirtoaca will be serving his third
\nterm as mayor of Chisinau, thus keeping the pro-Moscow left away from the
\ncapital. In fact, the capital city has had an anti-communist mayor ever since
\nthe early 1990s, as Chirtoaca’s predecessors Nicolae Costin and Serafim
\nUrechean were also strong promoters of the Romanian identity. Together, the
\npro-western parties won more than two thirds of all local administration posts,
\ndespite losing Balti, the second largest city in Moldova, and Orhei, another
\nimportant city very close to Chisinau to two candidates backed by Moscow. Voter
\nturnout, however, stood at only 48%, which commentators say indicates citizen’s
\nlack of trust in the political class in general. <\/p>\n
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Moldova also lacks a functional
\ngovernment at the moment, following the resignation of prime minister Chiril
\nGaburici two weeks ago. He had come to power in February as the leader of a
\nminority cabinet supported by the Liberal Democratic Party and the Democratic
\nParty. The latter have already said they wish to start talks with the Liberals
\nto recreate the pro-western three-party majority that led the country between
\n2009 and 2014. <\/p>\n
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Given that the president of the
\nrepublic is elected by Parliament, Dorin Chirtoaca, who is the vice-president
\nof the Liberal Party and the politician with the largest number of citizen
\nvotes, can give his party – the most distinctive pro-Romanian, pro-NATO and
\nanti-corruption voice on the political scene in Moldova – an advantage during
\nthe talks. During the Liberals’ half year in opposition, the image of the
\nRepublic of Moldova has been affected by huge corruption scandals. As a result,
\nthe International Monetary Fund and the World Bank decided to cut the country’s
\ncredit lines, while Moldova’s goal of entering the European Union in 2020 seems
\nto have become utopian. <\/p>\n
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Incumbent mayor wins local elections in capital Chisinau, while pro-European parties secure two thirds of local seats.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":105,"featured_media":64533,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[37738],"tags":[30247,29130],"coauthors":[],"class_list":["post-64532","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-today-in-the-news","tag-elections","tag-moldova"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n