Filat Will Return to the Big Moldovan Politics?

Sergey Cheban Judging by the first actions of the released ex-Prime Minister, he clearly isn’t going intend to stay in the shadows Before the Moldovan public recovered from the sudden collapse of the ruling coalition and changes in the country’s government, it was overtaken by a new surprise. Unfortunately, it was not the social and economic breakthrough promised by the PSRM, but the high-profile release from prison of the former Moldovan Prime Minister and ex-leader of the Liberal Democratic Party Vlad Filat. Convicted in 2016 for 9 years in the case of theft of a billion Filat was released on parole, 3 years before his time. The verdict of one of the capital’s courts also overturned the decision to deprive the former Moldovan official of the highest state award, the Order of the Republic, and lifted a five-year ban on holding public office. The early release of the former Prime Minister was somewhat of a surprise for local politicians, who began to repudiate any involvement in the incident, throwing the blame for Filat’s release on each other like a ‘hot potato’. For example, according to Igor Dodon, the court decision was a surprise for him, so he immediately assumed that the events around Filat are the result of the efforts of the government of Maia Sandu. In response, the former Prime Minister said that such a high-profile decision was possible only with the Dodon-controlled Moldovan justice. Vlad Filat himself stated his intention to focus on his personal life and only to be social with people who are engaged in politics. Despite this, some things show that from the first minutes after his release he acted consistently and with advance political and technological preparation for the return. First of all, it’s notable that all the politician’s movements with policy contents are constantly covered in the media.  First of all, it concerns the visit of ‘spiritual self-perfecting’ to the Moldovan Metropolitan Vladimir and further arrival at the father’s house to ‘repent’ to his parents. The second day of his release was devoted to intensive information work, which resulted in the first interview of the former Prime Minister on the Moldovan online media outlet tribuna.md. This resource, as it is known, belongs to the political scientist and publicist Igor Volnitsky close to Filat. Further, the media warm-up continued at an hour and a half press conference in the most open communication with journalists. A superficial analysis of the conversation leads to the conclusion that at the current stage Vlad Filat had the task not to speak in public with some tough and targeted statements, but to place maximum emphasis on himself – ‘the victim of political and judicial outrage’. No wonder he used, for example, such exaggerated lexical forms as “50 months in prison”. Thus, the first cautious steps of Filat have all the signs that the experienced Moldovan politician is not going to retreat into the shadows. On the contrary, he is determined to return to big politics and perhaps even lead a party project. It is obvious that this hypothetical political force will fight for the voters on the right flank and directly compete with Maia Sandu. This is mainly in the interests of Igor Dodon, further justifying the hypothesis of the Moldovan President’s behind-the-scenes agreements with Filat, which played a crucial role in making the ‘correct’ court decision. Based on the fact that the former ‘prisoner of the regime’ emphasizes that his case was considered in the ECHR, it can be assumed that as the European court makes a rehabilitating decision, the political image of Vlad Filat will be renovated. For example, from the culprit of the theft of a billion to the victim of the oligarchic regime. Who, unlike the ‘sterile’ Maia Sandu, has a special moral right to become the main leader of the struggle for independent justice in Moldova. Apparently, in the near future we can expect a consistent process of political reanimation of Vlad Filat and his gradual integration into the system, as well as in pretty complicated electoral scenarios. We can definitely say that the figure of the former Prime Minister will become an additional irritant among the pro-European and pro-Romanian forces, whose disunity has already allowed the socialists and Igor Dodon to take over the power in Moldova.