Activity of the Government on September 13–26, 2005

Appointments

During its September 14 session Government appointed MP Mihail Camerzan as Republic of Moldova Ambassador to Portugal. The diplomatic mission was opened in early 2005 and the position so far was vacant.

Currently, Mihail Camerzan is a deputy in Parliament on the Communist Party list. Over 2001–2005 he hold the position of Deputy Speaker. Coming to Parliament on the Braghis Alliance list he left the faction once appointed as Deputy Speaker. Over 1998–2001 Camerzan was the Secretary of the Parliament Permanent Bureau being in the “For a Democratic and Prosperous Moldova” faction headed by Dumitru Diacov.

Noteworthy, 9 Communist deputies resigned since March after being promoted to various positions in the central government. Recently Government proposed appointing another former Communist deputy Ion Filimon as Republic of Moldova Ambassador to Belarus. Ion Filimon is the 87 on the Communist candidate list.

In 2001 Parliament passed the Law on Diplomatic Service providing certain conditions for candidates to diplomatic service, such as: previous experience in diplomatic service, serving in the relevant ministry or other institutions specialized in international affairs, fluency in at least one foreign language.

Sessions. Resolutions

Computers for schools

During a working session convened by Prime-Minister with the participation of education officials it was found that the enforcement of the “Salt” (Leap) plan is delayed. Only 85% of the schools have computers, it is planned that by the end of September each Moldovan school would have at least one computer. There are no figures on the average number of computers in each school, or their access to Internet.

“Salt” program was initiated back in 2004 by the President in view of providing each Moldovan school with computers having access to internet. According to the Ministry of Education, there are no computers in over 250 schools, while only 54% of the schools have computer classrooms (on average 50 children per computer), the great majority of which being opened back in 1997–1998.

In late 2004 Government approved a Resolution (No 1424–22.12.2004) on enforcing “Salt” program obliging Ministry of Transportation and Communications to provide free access to internet to schools by September 1, 2005. The same resolution obliged the Ministry of Education and Ministry of Finance to find the resources necessary for purchasing 6,000 computers for schools.

Government also entrusted local councils to purchase the equipment for networks rayon of the and municipal education departments, as well as allot funds for intern connection and provide Internet services to schools. Experts say it was because of this delegation of responsibilities that the plan’s enforcement was delayed as the local budgets were already approved.

Currently there are over 1,600 education institutions in the Republic of Moldova (schools, gymnasiums, lyceums and colleges). A school in rural area would need at least 10–12 computers, with an average 8,000 MDL per computer (636 USD). Albeit the “Salt” program is about to be complete in several months, there are no data on the number of computers purchased from state funds, their price, nor whether the copyright law was observed.

Resolutions

Exemptions from taxes in agriculture

On its September 14 session Government approved a string of amendments canceling some agricultural taxes. As of 2006, agricultural farms would only pay land tax (worth 1.5 MDL (0.12 USD) for hectare) and social security tax. Legal entities and farms would be exempted from a number of taxes, namely: income tax; real estate tax; territory planning tax, water and road fund. It is estimated that the amendments would deprive local budgets of 35 million MDL(2.8 billion USD) yearly.

Under a special law approved by the Parliament, over 2004–2005 a pilot project was implemented in Taraclia whereby a single agricultural tax was approved, however its results haven’t been made public yet. There are evidences that the project failed, while via its new initiative the Government attempts to diminish the negative effects of VAT, which is to be applied commencing 2006.

Noteworthy, this issue might trigger some controversial debates in Parliament, as many deputies claimed the move would give rise to embezzlement, but also protests from local government deprived from its sources of revenues.

Approval of 2006 budget

Government approved draft state budget and draft social security budget for the next year, draft law on obligatory medication insurance for 2006, as well as mid-term expenses forecast (2006–2008).

The Government prepared a few surprises for tax-payers, namely:

Raised VAT: — A 20% VAT shall be applied for fito-technical, zoo-technical and horticular goods; cancelled VAT exemptions on import of pesticides and machinery; 8% VAT shall be applied on import and delivery of medicines;
Introduced new taxes: private tax (1% on privatizing units in state property); 0.8% tax to commercial banks when paying taxes to the state.
Preserved the highest 20% quota on income tax paid by natural entities on amounts exceeding 21,000 MDL (167 USD) yearly/ 1,750 MDL (139 USD) monthly.
Raising to 3% the social security tax paid by the employee.
Raising by 151 MDL (12 USD) the obligatory medical insurance, worth 816 MDL (65 USD).

The draft budget also allots 170 million MDL (13.52 million USD) for the “Moldovan Village” National Program. According to initial estimates the program was to cost over 45 billion MDL (39.8 million USD) in 2005–2015, out of which 7 billion MDL (356.7 million USD) were to be spent over 2005–2006. Annually around 160 million MDL (12.7 million USD) are needed for renovating water supply and sewage networks, for extending gas networks — 200 million MDL (15.9 billion USD), and for environment — about 500 million MDL (39.8 million USD).

When the draft budget was presented, Prime-Minister insisted on “consulting public opinion”. All our attempts to send our propositions to Government and Ministry of Finance from their official web page (where the document was posted for public debates) failed. On top of that, trade unions and employers’ union submitted a package of recommendations, while Government again failed to take many of them into consideration (especially as regards salary raise, investments, and support of agriculture, etc).

e-democracy.md