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Wednesday, March 2, 2011 Promo-LEX Association organized the public debate on topic “The elections of 28 November 2010 through the prism of improving the Moldovan electoral processes”.

Based on the findings of the Final Monitoring Report of the early parliamentary elections of 28 November 2010, this public debate focused on issues such as poor preparation of voter lists, lack of financial transparency from candidates in terms of reflecting expenditure and the use of administrative resources for electoral purposes.

At the opening event, Ion Manole of Promo-LEX said that “although the Central Election Commission was one of the most open and transparent government institutions in recent years and was successfully conducted within a fairly narrow period between two Parliamentary elections and a referendum, there is much more to do. This is demonstrated by the numerous findings, conclusions and recommendations contained in the reports of observers monitoring the elections from Promo-LEX”. In this context, Ion Manole stressed the necessity and importance of continuing the partnership between civil society and electoral bodies.

According to Iurie Ciocan, President of the Central Election Commission, one of the main remaining issues was that of voter rolls. During the debate the need for intervention in the procedure for compilation and verification of voter lists was emphasized. “We have a clear position on the proposals and despite gaps in the exchange of opinion we have established some regulatory pathways,” said Iurie Ciocan.

Irregularities in reporting of expenditures by electoral competitors have also been detected. Pavel Postica, lawyer at Promo-LEX and Deputy Chief of the monitoring effort stated that it may be the case that the Election Commission needs to review the rules, in order to require competitors to show very clear how money is managed. This is also relevant in the context of the upcoming local elections, where the control over financial transparency will lie on District Election Commissions, which will mean even less opportunity to verify the financial transparency of electoral competitors.”

In the discussions were drawn the main recommendations made by Promo-LEX, including the need to establish a single mechanism for checking the validity of its registration by voters in electoral lists, simplification of the procedures for checking the logical validity of the vote counting and to establish a clear mechanism to verify data for the detection of inconsistencies in the protocols.

Participants attended the event concluded that such debates are welcomed, and not only around local or parliamentary elections, and attempts to improve the electoral process must be continuous, contributing thus to the ultimate goal to have free and fair elections.

Nicolae Panfil, Secretary of the Coalition for Free and Fair Elections stated: “It is important that after the release of monitoring reports to have such discussions on the conclusions and recommendations so that we make them be heard, and thus improve the effective organization of elections. This event has started what we may consider an activity in view of the upcoming elections and both the Coalition and Promo-LEX will already be mobilized in this regard ”

The event was attended by representatives of the electoral authorities, central and local public authorities, political parties and of the civil society.

For more details, contact: Ion Manole, President, Promo-LEX Association
Tel: (22) 450024, GSM: 069070800, e-mail: [email protected]