Political Freedom in Moldova
Human Rights Violations in Moldova
Summer 2015
Human Rights always have been a vast problem in Republic of Moldova like violence against women, discrimination against minorities, hate speech in public which you can hear from a lot of public members, freedom of speech, media and a high level of crime andcorruption.Oligarchs and politicians have control of most media outlets. That’s why all the mass media is corrupt and the people don’t have access to the real facts and information that is happening in the country.
On 3rd May 2015, thousands of people have rallied in the center of capital Chisinau against the government accusing politicians of corruption and crime. From three banks of Moldova disappeared one billion dollar which was transferred to four other banks in Russia. One of the person accused of the stolen money is the businessman and oligarch Ilan Shor which recently won the mayor seat in Orhei at the local elections.It is not something new that the leaders of this country that suppose to make this country prosper are the robbers themselves.
The stole of the money might be planed and done with the help of Russians which are against of Moldova being a part of Europe Union and because all the action happened right before Moldova was hoping to ease its passage into EU at the Riga summit for Eastern Partnership.
June 28, 2015 in 457 localities of Moldova including the capital Chisinau was held the runoff elections for mayor. That’s because none of the candidates obtained in the first round 50% of votes to win the race.The participation rate registered throughout the country was of 47.73% and in the capital Chisinau 48.67%.
Democratic Party won the local elections with the highest number of mayoral seats.The party will be represented by 287 mayors in different towns of Moldova. The second place took the Liberal- Democrats with 285 mayors and the third place took the Communist Party with 77 seats.In the capital Chisinau the winning party was Liberal Party with 53.54% headed by Dorin Chirtoaca. He already won the reelection for mayor for the third time.
A lot of violations were fixed during the local elections in Moldova. Observers from Promo-Lex signaled at least 3 cases when voting was occurred without checking the attachment of ID. In another case voters came to the polling station with his passport, but with loose leaf nephew. In a village in Floreşti found two blank ballots in the grass near the polling station.Also it was observed cases of electoral propaganda. Next to the polling station in a village in Causeni stood a candidate for mayor and urged the people to vote him.It is known that people with disabilities are the most discriminated in Moldova. Several polling stations have no ramps for people with disabilities. In one polling station, a person with disabilities could not enter the building, so a person from the commission took the ballot outside so the disabled person could vote.
The saddest part of the local elections throughout the country is that just a few people showed up to the voting stations. Only 47.73% came out to vote, that number shows that citizens of Moldova don’t trust any of the political parties and already give up on their lies and false promises that they make.The fight against corruption inside the country represents a continual process that looks like it doesn’t have an end. Authorities will take no actions if the people of this country would not come in streets and protest.
Dina
Human Rights Violation in Moldova
According to the Criminal Code of Moldova the legislation bans use of torture, inhuman or degrading treatments or punishments and guarantees the protection of human beings against such kind of actions from the part of the law enforcement agencies. Due to difficult political situation in Transnistria region, the law enforcement agencies of the Republic of Moldova do not have control over Transnistria because their authorities have created their own judiciary and law enforcement system and the collaboration with this agencies is almost impossible.
The most significant human rights problem and in the country is the government corruption, which undermined the credibility and effectiveness of the police and the judiciary as well as respect for the rule of law. Another major concern is the police torture and mistreatment of the people in the detention, inadequate conditions in prison, violence against woman, people trafficking and the harassment of the people with disabilities.
However, there have been reports of violations of the right to life and physical integrity, including cases of torture, abuse or even deaths of detainees and prisoners in detention centers. These cases often remain unsolved or are never thoroughly investigated. Police officers accused of torture or ill treatment are rarely brought to trial or punished for their actions. Targets for police harassment and violence are also the Roma people, women and gay men. The situation is especially acute for persons in psychiatric hospitals, who have been exposed to verbal, physical and sexual abuses, deprivation of food and who have also been subjected to forced labour.
The situation in most of Moldova prisons is poor and inadequate. The majority of facilities are in need of urgent repair, there are no sanitary conditions to accommodate the number of persons, especially in pre-trial facilities. Prisoners with infectious diseases are generally not separated from others in the prison population and do not have adequate access to qualified medical professionals.Psychological assistance for prisoners is also unavailable. However, international pressure has made a positive impact on provisional detention centers, where conditions have reportedly improved.
For prisoners in Transnistria, the situation is critical. Water is unsanitary and contributes to disease and poor dental health among prisoners. There is no access to qualified medical care and a high rate of prison population with tuberculosis, HIV/AIDS and dental problems. In all the cases , the relatives are those who pay the cost of the medical assistance.
Corruption within the juridical system continue to be a big problem. Some credible reports indicate that the prosecutors and judges receive bribes in return for reducing the charges, frequent and unjustified annulments of hearings.
Women and men are equal under the country’s Constitution. Although women are underrepresented in public life. There are now 16 women in the legislative forum out of 101 deputies, one woman holds the position of Chairman of Parliament. There is one female minister and seven deputy ministers within the Cabinet. The Chairman of the Supreme Court is also a woman.
Moldova is also a significant source for women and girls trafficked abroad for forced prostitution and forced labor.Moldovan victims are subjected to sex and labor trafficking within Moldova and in Russia, Ukraine, Turkey, United Arab Emirates, Greece, Cyprus, and other countries. Women and minors are subjected to sex trafficking in Moldova in brothels, saunas, and massage parlors. Moldovan men are subjected to forced labor in agriculture and construction in Ukraine and Russia. Moldovan women are also subjected to forced labor in agriculture in Ukraine. Foreign tourists, including those from Europe, Thailand, Australia, Israel, subject Moldovan children to commercial sexual exploitation. Corruption in the judicial system poses an acute challenge for bringing traffickers to justice because the judicial corruption impede persecution and influence the outcome cases.The government did not open any new criminal cases against officials involved in trafficking-related crimes and convicted only one complicit official. Official complicity in trafficking is a significant problem in Moldova.
Rally against Oligarchy Dictatorship
September,2015
On the 6th of September over 100.000 of people rallied on Sunday in the heart of the capital Chisinau in the biggest street protest against the dictatorship of the“oligarchs” who control key sectors of Moldova.
The people were asking the resignation of the presidents Nicolae Timofti and the $1 billion bank scam to be prosecuted.
Protesters threatened to stage a non- stop demonstration until their demands were met. Many of protesters spend the night in the National Square in the tents.
The protest is the biggest demonstration since Moldova seceded from Soviet Union which has been one of the poorest countries in Europe since its independence movement in the early 1990s. The protesters streamed into the capital from different rural and urban regions of Moldova with Romanian and European Union flags.
Meanwhile the authorities scheduled an open-air free concert at Moldexpo with big-name Russian, Romanian and Moldavian pop stars to coincide with the protest, with local media reporting that some were paid upwards of $100,000 for participating. The protesters condemned the move as an extravagant bribe, and many of the local performers pulled out just hours before they were due to go on stage. A lot of disputed were on the internet hours before the concert, people where contacting the artist on their personal pages and imploring them not to participate in this concert but to come and support the protesters in the center of Chisinau. Some of the Moldavian singers that rejected to be in the concert gave patriotic speeches and encouraged the people gathered in the National Square and also actively participated in the protest. Also Romanian singers refused to sing at Moldexpo and wrote on their pages their supports for Moldavian people.
Late on Sunday afternoon, the government accepted an official list of demands from the organizers, but refused their request to speak directly to the hostile crowd.
Moldovian Education is becoming a victim of dirty political campaigning
October 2016
Moldova is on the threshold of presidential elections and the electoral campaign is full swing. Methods the candidates promote theirselves differ from one to another each tries to explain why is he /she the right person for that.
Thus, Moldova’s Presidential Election has direct influence on the national educational system. This is proved by several cases of abusive involvement of the candidates in the universities and high schools from Chisinau.
These situations show how certain political actors act in inappropriate and illegal ways to gather as many votes as possible, Recently, in one of the universities from capital ( ULIM ), during lessons, some representatives of the Democratic Party of Moldova came with call-up for students to vote for their candidate, and if they do it they should confirm by a photo and they were promised not to have any problems with university’s situation and they will receive a month ticket for local public transport. Another case occurred in A.S.Pushkin school from capital where another representative of the candidate Inna Popenco together with some volunteers entered the classroom of high school classes during the lessons without having any problem from security or teachers and distributing free bags with different items reminding of the candidate.
Examples can continue and we can notice an exaggeration regarding the transmission of the election message. Moreover, it’s even about tough propaganda in education institutions which is forbidden by Moldavian Law .
The only way of promoting political message in schools is to gather pupils who want to attend this meeting after lessons or their breaks and to promote yourself. Some candidates to find a way for suiting the legal path of this activity and in their discussions with the schools administration, they do promise something, but the teachers should gather on meetings with him/ her, every pupil that has more than 18 years old. The pupils who refuse to attend are threatened with problems in their educational success or are kindly requesting a mandatory presence as some pupils from : Mircea Eliade and Ion Creanga Lyceums reported to the EUPAS representatives in Moldova.
Bearing in mind that Moldova is a country that wants to develop a better educational system and threatening pupils with their educational success for political reasons is not the best way for that, we should call upon the Ministry of Education of Moldova, Election Central Commitee of Moldova, European Parliament Members and institutions involved in monitoring the presidential elections to take act of this problem and to ensure that the right on education and the Moldovan law is respected.
Igor Tulyantsev: Corruption is the scourge of Moldova
February,2021
Maia Sandu is another beautiful picture behind which the people of the oligarch Vlad Plahotniuc are hiding. She herself has already managed to visit Vlad Filat’s government controlled by him, closed many schools and abolished the Russian language. Will Sandu’s Harvard team now be able to fight corruption and outright banditry in Plahotniuc’s system? These and many other questions from the host of Pravda.Ru, Lyubov Stepushova, were answered by Igor Tulyantsev, chairman of the Moldovan Public Council For a Free Motherland.
Sandu nominated the prime minister, for whom she calls not to vote
Igor Tulyantsev: Nobody in parliamentary Moldova trusts parliament
— Igor, why is it impossible for most of the former post-Soviet republics to establish some kind of minimum social package. In Russia, nevertheless, a more or less real living wage is provided, although, of course, you want more and better. We are coping well with the coronavirus. With medicine in general — more or less, although we scold.
Why in sunny Moldova and neighboring Ukraine, striving for Europeanization, do not manage to organize even the smallest human package for their citizens? And then, after all, many of them do not even have enough pensions to pay for housing and communal services.
— Yes, this is not the case, although Moldova has money inside the country. The biggest problem for Moldova is corruption. This is not even just a problem, but a scourge. All government bodies are deeply saturated with corruption. Absolutely all officials and deputies are sitting on kickbacks, theft, lawlessness, nepotism … This is our biggest problem.
I think it’s the same in Ukraine, we are not very different in this regard. In fact, Zelensky won the election because he promised to do something good in this regard.
And there everyone watched the film «Servant of the People». The main idea of this film is to free the country from corruption, which has become ossified. Politicians there, like ours, easily move from party to party — they are happy to buy and sell.
In power, people who know how to make only such schemes. They are professionally engaged in pumping money out of the financial system of the state. These are people who every day, every day, get into the pocket of their citizens.
Therefore, it does not even make sense to talk today about why some enterprises or medicine are not developed. Because people in the government, parliament and in general in all government bodies are pumping money out of the budget with huge shovels.
This is the main problem of our country. If it is resolved, then there will be money for the development of the economy and other areas.
And now, if we drive through the elite districts near Chisinau and throughout Moldova, we will see all this money in the form of luxury houses, luxury cars, in the form of restaurants and luxury hotels, which are acquired by these so-called «servants of the people». And there is money in the country …
— Maybe Sandu is not such a bad choice if she can cope with the oligarchy, with Plahotniuc? But can it, do you think? Moreover, she does not seem to set herself such a task, but is fixated on something completely different.
The cabinet of ministers she is proposing is entirely composed of pro-Western Western people, they studied and worked there. It is clear that they have absorbed this Western spirit and boast all the time that they cannot steal budget money and so on. Is this really so, and can the Western experience help in the current Moldovan situation?
— I can assume that perhaps she herself would like to put things in order in the country in her own way. But there are already corruption scandals with her inner circle.
And these her, as we say, «guys from Harvard», even if they were really honest and incorruptible, they will not be able to do anything with the guys with big fists from Plahotniuc.
These lads will quickly drive the guys from Harvard, excuse the expression, under the bucket, because these are completely different people, they need to be dealt with in a completely different way. You just need to take them by the throats and put them in jail.
— As in our time, Khodorkovsky was imprisoned, then somehow more or less things went smoothly.
— I will give another example in this context. Former General Prosecutor of Romania Laura Kövesi was recently confirmed as the first Chief Prosecutor of the European Union. So she was not afraid to take on and investigate the most complex and major cases, she put high-ranking officials in prison.
Of course, it is not necessary to plant in lawlessness. Because Plahotniuc learned to plant just out of lawlessness.
Under him, honest businessmen and, in general, ordinary, normal people had nothing, and those who expressed a different opinion about Plahotniuc’s policy were just in prison. Only people like Dodon and the company who supported him grew and developed.
Sandu has already played a trick for a long time
By the way, Maia Sandu also managed to participate in the government as the Minister of Education, formed by the PLDM party. It was then headed by Vlad Filat, who later went to jail for corruption.
It was during Sandu’s tenure as the head of Moldovan education that a lot of schools were closed, and the Russian language became optional. As a matter of fact, this is one of the complaints against Maya Sand. People remember that she did not show herself very well as Minister of Education.
Then there were very negative radical changes. Schools cannot be closed. Where schools are closed, then new prisons are built. Therefore, of course, there were already serious mistakes in her political career.
But all the same, I do not exclude that she will at least try to change the situation with corruption, start this difficult struggle with the mafia in power and at least partially do something. This, of course, we all would very much like.
But most likely, the team that surrounds Maia Sanda, such intelligent Harvard boys and girls, will not be able to cope with the bandit regime built by Plahotniuc.
While they, with a clever look, adjusting their glasses, will reflect on the beautiful, on human rights, on freedom of choice, on the European dream, the same people of Plahotniuc will siphon money from the budget of our country with shovels. Therefore, I am skeptical about this.