Prospects for a Unified Center-Left Bloc in the Moldovan Parliamentary Elections

The disunity of the center-left forces disorientates the nuclear electorate and thus, reduces their chances of winning the July elections Vladimir ROTAR, RTA: The closer July 11 approaches, the more we witness interesting sociology. Tellingly, the figures presented to the public are sometimes very different - for example, the Association of Sociologists and Demographers of Moldova, close to the socialists, gave approximately equal proportions to the Action and Solidarity party and the bloc of communists and socialists, while WatchDog.md gives PAS more than half of the votes. It seems that the truth lies somewhere in the middle, as usual. Anyway, from all these polls do so far show only one specific that fact can be taken out: just the two above-mentioned forces have guaranteed chances of victory, and along with them a certain number of deputies from the SHOR party will almost certainly step into the new legislative body". Then, further on, the electoral terra incognita begins. However, it can be noted that forces as potential PAS partners have come closest to the parliament threshold. These are primarily the Renato Usatii block and the DA Platform. There are unionists as well. But, as colleagues have already noted, they again failed to come to an agreement among themselves and now, they are forced to squeeze in a narrow electoral clearing, waging, in fact, an interspecific struggle. As for the healthy - not "spoilers" - center-left forces, their situation is somewhat worse. Not a single poll gives the same Civic Congress or the "Party for Development and Unification of Moldova" (PROM) more than 2-3 percent, which, of course, is not enough to receive parliamentary mandates. Such unsuccessful intermediate results have various reasons. The Civic Congress, created in 2019, was never able to break into. It would seem that a reasonable stake on the socio-economic, not the geopolitical agenda has not yet worked properly, primarily due to the extreme limited resources and the absence of big names in the party composition. In fact, the Civic Congress is represented in the media by Marc Tcaciuc alone, who has to single-handedly pull the party's rating. In order to somehow promote its brand during the current campaign, Congress tried to exclude the unionist Alliance for the Unification of Romanians from the race - but failed. PROM, as it seems, simply does not have enough time to build up. Its leader and front man, Ion Chicu, is a good choice, at least from the point of view of recognition and reputation of a more or less adequate and professional manager by Moldovan standards. However, so far, the distrustful Moldovan voter is very wary of almost all newcomers to the electoral list, preferring to carry votes to possibly boring, but still familiar faces. It is difficult to exactly say what was the way both formations assessed their own prospects. It can be recalled that the same Civic Congress promoted the idea of early elections almost from its inception in 2019, but was never able to approach them in good shape. Both formations are trying to position themselves as "technocratic", representing the intellectual flank of Moldovan politics - without pretentious slogans and populism. The demand for the development of such projects in society has long been ripe, but in these elections, it was clearly not fully worked out. However, it is possible that both parties did not plan to get results here and now and intended to use the July vote only as a springboard for further increase the number of their supporters. On the other hand, such calculations carry considerable risks. As all indications show, it is obvious how much importance do Chisinau's international partners attach to the upcoming elections. The recent history of the CEC's decision on voting polls for the diaspora, which ended in hysteria of pro-European forces, protests, as well as threats and pressure on the members of the Commission, only once again confirmed how fiercely the pro-Europeans will be ready to fight for their unconditional victory. As the head of state said the other day, "the time for elegant solutions has passed." There is no particular doubt that in the future, if PAS wins, she will repeat this phrase more than once, when a massive offensive against all the current opponents of the pro-Western forces is to begin. The way this will exactly happen can be observed following the example of neighboring Ukraine, where one after another very original and often violating the legal foundations of initiatives, such as the “law on oligarchs”, are being born - in fact, another repressive tool in the hands of President Volodymyr Zelensky against his political enemies. This process will surely be complemented by developing a network of foreign advisers and consultants, who are closely watching so that this time Moldova does not exactly deviate from the vigorous march towards Euro-Atlantic integration. This suggests that it is desirable to act here and now. At the same time, all polls indicate that most center-left forces have no chance of winning alone. Moreover, approaching the elections in such a disunited form, they, like the unionists, only interfere with each other, delaying votes and disorienting voters. Perhaps, it is worth correcting the tactics of action - at least in the direction of mobilizing rhetoric with a moratorium on criticism of ideologically similar participants in the campaign, before it’s too late. The best solution seems to be at least temporary integration into a single formation with the inclusion of the most famous and prominent figures from each party in the general list. In this case, one could count on a synergistic effect that had a beneficial effect on the prospects of the entire left flank. Moreover, in the future, after the elections are over, no one bothers to leave the bloc, create a separate faction and play an independent game. There is still time left for such maneuvers - during the next two weeks, the necessary changes can still be made to the electoral lists. Socialists and communists have previously set the trend by reconciling differences and overcoming the mutual dislike of the two leaders for a common goal. If other center-left parties do as well want to really take part in governing the country and get the opportunity to change the system from within, well, they should perhaps think about similar steps yet today.