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The financing of the political parties is a relatively new topic, which is too briefly discussed yet in the Republic of Moldova. For a better understanding, Promo-LEX Association, financially supported by the British Embassy in Chisinau through the Good Governance Fund, initiated the development of a Study on Practices and Methods used by Political Parties for the Financing of their Activity and the Achievement of Statuary Goals.

“We spotlighted the membership fees because they are the political parties’ main source of self-financing. The rest of financing mechanisms are external, that is private financing. At this point, we encounter a big issue in the Republic of  Moldova, because as long as membership fees cannot ensure the parties self-financing, they are left at the discretion of private donors, who in most cases are interested groups”, Pavel Postica, Director of the Program Monitoring Democratic Processes, Promo-LEX Association.

Following the development and enforcement of the methodology, the statutes of those 43 political parties, registered until 1 December 2015 with the Ministry of Justice, were analysed during the documentation. One of the first issues registered in respect of the financing of the political parties activity is related to the way of regulating the amount of membership fees.

Cornelia Calin, Promo-LEX analyst, submitted preliminary data and mentioned the following: “The statutes of 21 political parties (49% of the total number), contrary to the amendments to the Law on Political Parties made in April 2015, do not regulate expressly the amount of the fees. In 18 cases (42% of the total number) out of them, the membership fees are set and regulated in internal documents adopted by party collegial structures (National Politic Council, Standing Bureaus, Republican Council, National Coordination Council, etc.) through particular minutes or other internal regulations. The statutes of other 3 political entities (7% of the total number) do not include any provisions on the regulation of the membership fees and the amount/ procedure for payment of these contributions which are mandatory according to provisions of the current legislation”.

Thus, currently only 22 political parties (51% of the total number) regulated in their statutes the amount and procedure for payment of membership fees. In this context, Promo-LEX Association notes that the lack of express regulations included in the political parties’ statutes on the amount and procedure for payment of the membership fee, will represent, since 1 January 2016, a violation of the Article 25 (3) of the Law on Political Parties.

Other relevant aspects set at this stage of documentation are related to the quantum of membership fees. According to the statutes of the political parties which expressly stipulate the amount of membership fee, in 7 cases the membership fee vary from MDL 1 to 5. Other parties set their membership fee in amount from MDL 6 to 20 (in 4 cases) and from MDL 21 to 100 (in other 4 cases). In case of 6 parties that set the membership fee in their statute, its amount vary from 0.2% to 2.5% out of the monthly salary or income, pension, scholarship, while one political party set the quantum of its membership fee in the amount of 5% from the minimal salary on economy of the member of the political entity. According to the political parties’ statutes that expressly regulate the amount of membership fee, the latter are paid monthly in 18 cases (75%), quarterly in 1 case (4%) and annually in 5 cases (21%).

Pavel Postica emphasized that those 21 political parties, which are registered with the Ministry of Justice and which did not yet align their provisions of their Statute to the legal ones, violate the law in force.

“Thus, we recommend the Ministry of Justice to make a call to political parties, which did not made the appropriate amendments to their Statutes, to do so. The parties should be aware that they may not receive allocations from the state budget”, the Director of Promo-LEX Program added.

Promo-LEX analysis on the political parties’ membership fees is one of the first findings developed under the Project “Fighting political corruption in the Republic of Moldova by improving political parties’ funding regulations and civic oversight”, which was implemented during 1 December 2015 – 31 March 2016. This Project is implemented by Promo-LEX Association, through Good Governance Fund of the British Embassy in Chisinau.

The responsibility for the provided information rely on Promo-LEX Association and it does not necessarily reflect the position and opinion of the British Embassy.

For more details, please contact: Carolina Bondarciuc, Press Officer Promo-LEX: GSM 069637849, Tel/Fax (+373 22) 450024, e-mail: [email protected]