Anti-Communist Protests in Moldova

By Ioana Botea


Over 10,000 people gathered in Moldova’s capital last week to denounce the results of the parliamentary election that saw the communists return to power. According to the preliminary results, the incumbent Communist Party received over 50 percent of the votes. The parliamentary majority allows it to select the next president unilaterally. Outside monitors declared the April 5 elections fair, but there are accusations of vote rigging and voter lists that allegedly included deceased people.

Protesters threw stones, broke windows, and ultimately raided government buildings in Moldova’s capital Chisinau. When the police intervened to thwart the anti-communist rallies, violence erupted and a score of people were injured. Valeriu Boboc, 23, died in the confrontations. By Wednesday, 200 people had already been arrested.

President Vladimir Voronin accused neighboring Romania of instigating the protests,
by consulting with opposition leaders and mobilizing young people. He expelled Romania’s ambassador and introduced a new visa regime for Romanians. However, there is no evidence of Romanian involvement in the anti-government protests of last week.

Moldova, the poorest country in Europe, was part of Romania until 1940 when it was occupied by Soviet troops. Since its independence in 1991, it has been ruled by the Communist Party which maintains close links to Kremlin. In recent years, demands for closer ties with Romania, a new E.U. member, have strengthened. Despite the fact that the majority of Moldovans favor getting closer to Europe, the mainly Soviet-trained and Russian-speaking political elite has been reluctant to break ties with Russia.

Most of last week’s protesters were young people, who were organized via Twitter, and other social-networking sites. Because the overwhelming majority of demonstrators were students, the State Ministry of Education emitted a document forcing professors to keep students from participating in rallies. Mark E. Tkachuk, adviser to Mr. Voronin, explained, “We have told parents to keep their children in school. Because this is not about 3,000 people; it’s about hundreds of thousands. When we saw what happened at Parliament, what happened at the presidential palace – well, this means civil war, which cannot be allowed.”

Supporting the anti-communist opposition in Chisinau, its mayor, Darin Chitimacha, declared that, “the young people threw out portraits of Voronin and Lenin and others because they have come to hate them. They understand that their future has been stolen. They understand that their votes in the parliamentary elections were stolen. Regimes that use terror end badly.” (The New York Times)

Moldova’s Constitutional Court authorized a recount of the votes from the April 5 election. Results are expected to be publically announced in 9 days. In the meantime, the European Union is expected to take quick diplomatic actions to restore stability on in the region. Since the Georgian war in August 2008, and the Ukrainian crisis in January 2009, there have been increasing concerns regarding more violence and instability erupting on its eastern flank. A summit between the E.U. and its six eastern neighbors – Moldova, Ukraine, Georgia, Belarus, Armenia, and Azerbaijan, is scheduled in Prague on 7 May.