Activity of the Parliament on November 1–15, 2006

Rules. Immunities

The Parliament has approved Carmelia Albu as member of the electronic media watchdog CCA for a 4-year term. Albu was proposed by the council of unions of radio and television employees.

Examining a proposal by the Superior Council of Magistracy, the Parliament has appointed three judges of the Supreme Court of Justice: Valeriu Arhip; Valentina Clevadi and Valeriu Doaga. Communist lawmakers did not vote for appointment of Gheorghe Ulianovschi, though the legal commission for rules and immunities has approved this candidacy and did not find any breaches related to the promotion procedure.

The Parliament took notice of the resignation of Communist Deputy Sergiu Stati. The 69^th candidate from the list of the Communist Party of Moldova will receive the vacant mandate.

Legislative acts

Law approving Title IX of the Tax Code and law on enforcement. It regulates the traffic taxes, calculation and administration of these taxes, quotas for envisaged subjects applied starting January 1, 2007.
Law on status of penal investigation officer. It regulates the status of penal investigators of the Interior Ministry, CCCEC and Customs Service who conduct penal investigations.
Law on completion of the Code of Motor Transport. The Government is empowered to approve the methodology of calculation of tariffs for passenger and luggage carriage by motor transport. Lawmakers noted that these amendments “legalise” previous decisions of the executive adopted by exceeding constitutional and legal competences.
Law on ratification of the European Convention on the Transfer of Proceedings in Criminal Matters. The May 15, 1972 convention is ratified with a series of reservations regarding refusal to investigate religious crimes or offences that must be sanctioned by an administrative authority.
Law on completion of legislative accts (anti-corruption survey). Under adopted amendments, draft legislative and normative laws will be surveyed against corruptibility in order to verify if they correspond to national and international anti-corruption standards and to prevent new regulations that favour or may favour corruption.
Draft law on insurance. The document voted in the second reading stipulates the rise of minimum social capital of insurance companies and the obligation that these companies turn into joint stock societies. According to the legislative programme for 2005–2009 (Parliament Decision # 300-XVI from 24.11.05), the new law on insurance should be adopted by the end of 2005, in order to ensure the execution of the E.U.-Moldova Action Plan (paragraph 2.4.2 (32) from EUMAP).
Draft law on processing of personal data. It seeks some regulations needed to guarantee respect and protection of rights of individuals to private life in connection with processing of personal data. According to the legislative programme, the law will be passed in the final reading by the end of 2006.

Parliamentary control. Statements

Questions and interpellations

Replying to a request by lawmakers, Minister of Transportation and Road Management Miron Gagauz said that Moldova will not redirect passenger trains through Transnistria because security of travellers will not be ensured.

Replying an interpellation by Democratic Deputy Vladimir Filat, the Ministry of Economy and Commerce said that Moldovan Government has started negotiations on Moldova’s debt for natural gas ceded by Gazprom to a Russian enterprise. Concrete information on results of negotiations was not presented. As of September 1, 2006, debts of Moldova Gaz accounted for 1,382,000,000 dollars, of them 1.85 billion dollars in debts of the Transnistrian region.

Gheorghe Susarenco has asked the Prosecutor’s Office to verify information regarding disappearance of topographic map of territorial delimitations in the Moldovan-Ukrainian border area^[1] from the state archives of Moldova in 1998. According to another interpellation, Susarenco has asked Moldovan Government to explain the participation of executive members in a November 7 meeting organised by Communist Party of Moldova (PCRM) and if the participation of ministers who are not PCRM members is a violation of Article 5 (2) of Constitution, which says that “no ideology can be instituted as an official ideology of the state.”

Citing a media report^[2], AMN Deputy Anatol Onceanu has asked the Centre for the Struggle Against Economic Crimes and Corruption (CCCEC) to verify if actions by local authorities in the district of Orhei seeking sponsoring of propagandistic actions by governance are not a hidden extortion and if the demand for cash is not corruption.

Democratic Deputy Valentina Buliga has asked the Government to report on granting of indemnities to young teachers, noting that there are cases of groundless refusal through wrong interpretation of law.

Veaceslav Untila, deputy chairman of the Our Moldova Alliance (AMN) faction, has asked the domestic security service SIS and the SIS-controlled special communication centre to report on checking of messages from emails, legal base and grounds of eventual controls.

Statements

Parliamentarian Anatol Taranu has sought the dismissal of Corneliu Mihalache from the post of member of the electronic media watchdog CCA because he has published a political article in Puls in his quality of chief editor and this is a violation of the oath of CCA members. A communist deputy replied that Mihalache has tendered his resignation from the newspaper of communist youth on the day when he was appointed a CCA member. Employees of the newspaper assured that the signing of an article by Mihalache was a technical mistake.

Deputy Vlad Cubreacov has read a statement on stance of the Christian Democratic faction toward an initiative by communist lawmakers seeking the stop of live broadcasting of the Parliament’s plenary sittings. The Christian Democratic People’s Party (PPCD) regrets the resumption of talks on this old and closed topic, recalling that this decision was one of the ten conditions of the PPCD for election of Moldovan president, a condition of the parliamentary political consensus. Giving up the live broadcasting would be a step backward, a negative signal for society and European partners of Moldova, while arguments taken to support this idea are not based on fair criteria. According to the PPCD: — the problem of broadcasting must be resolved by rightly administrating the allocated budgetary funds; — the problem of too long interventions of lawmakers must find a solution in the law on modification of the Parliament’s Regulation, while the promotion of populist initiatives of some lawmakers must be dammed by modifying the Constitution and awarding the right to legislative initiative to parliamentary factions only, not to separated groups of lawmakers. The PPCD appeals to the Moldovan president, who leads the PCRM, to keep the live broadcasting of plenary sittings of the Parliament in order to maintain political stability and continue the consistent implementation of democratic reforms.

Social Liberal deputies have asked the Moldovan president to explain in the Parliament the eventual pretensions of Chisinau against neighbouring states. Social Liberal Deputy Igor Clipii said that the relations of Moldova with all states in the region are unsatisfactory, including because actions and statements of President Vladimir Voronin. Elsewhere, Clipii sought the release of a report by UNDP/Moldova experts, which inserts findings and recommendations on efficient activity of the Parliament and its working groups. The speaker assured that this report will be made public when it is finalised.

PPCD Deputy Ion Varta has demanded the Parliament to revise members of a commission created by the Moldovan Academy of Sciences at the initiative of the chief of state to survey the integrated history textbooks from pre-university education system. Varta said that the commission was created on alarming principles and authors of the criticised textbooks are also members, this being an inadmissible action. The decision on inclusion of some persons who are not experts of history in this commission is also contested after a series of inaccuracies have been discovered in integrated history textbooks for schools.

↑ Article “Cheile de la Gurile Dunarii” published in the November 2, 2006 issue #104 of Ziarul de Garda.
↑ Article “Raket Orheian” published in the November 1, 2006 issue of newspaper Moldavskye Vedomosti.

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