Tarnavschi on 100 Million Lei Drop in Autonomy Revenues: We Are Losing Gagauzia

The former Gagauz People’s Assembly vice-speaker lost his post due to criticism of Gagauzia authorities. Alexandr Tarnavschi said that the region leadership supports Ilan Șor’s policy aimed at ‘worsening the situation, the relations with the official Chisinau’, so that ‘there is no dialogue, no results in the cooperation between Comrat and Chisinau’, gagauzinfo.md reports. ‘In the first three months of 2024, revenues of the main budget replenishment source - income tax of legal entities – have fallen by 47 per cent. More than 50 million lei was not received. If this continues, Gagauzia will lose more than 100 million lei in 2024. This is more than 25 per cent of the autonomy’s own central budget revenues,’ Alexandr Tarnavschi said. According to him, large companies operating in Gagauzia have changed their legal address to other territories of the country. Thus, the companies are physically located in Gagauzia, but they pay taxes in other regions. The politician, who has been involved in public finance for 20 years, ‘could have kept quiet and would have kept his job.’ ‘But I can’t say we’re doing well. In fact, I could have kept silent and would have kept my chair. Still, now it is not the time to adjust and be flexible. We need to speak frankly, because we are losing the foundations of Gagauzia that we had,’ Alexandr Tarnavschi concluded.