Expert-Grup

Press release: Auction for voters, paid for by voters – between populism, legality and electoral fantasies

Friday, 16 October 20202989 views
Press release: Auction for voters, paid for by voters – between populism, legality and electoral fantasies

Automatically translated summary. The full article is available in Romanian.

Candidates in the Republic of Moldova's presidential election of 1 November 2020 made many populist promises, mostly ignoring the head of state's constitutional powers. This is the conclusion of the study “Electoral promises, between populism and constitutional compliance” by Adrian Lupușor and Stas Madan of the Independent Think Tank “Expert-Grup”.

The study, prepared with the Friedrich Ebert Foundation Moldova, found that only five of eight candidates published platforms, and only three of these were relatively detailed. Most promises exceed the presidential mandate and suit a presidential or paternalist state, from street lighting to minimum pensions. Tudor Deliu's programme alone matches the constitutional mandate, though it is vague.

Igor Dodon's promises would cost about MDL 120 billion (around MDL 30 billion a year, 10-11% of GDP) with no clear funding sources. Maia Sandu's programme, costed at MDL 50-55 billion (5-5.5% of GDP) over four years, is deemed unsustainable. Violeta Ivanov's programme falls entirely outside the mandate, Octavian Țîcu gave no cost estimates, and Dorin Chirtoacă's unification promises look like a mirage.

View the original article in Romanian