PCRM: They Try to Gag Us so that People Don’t Know the Real Motives of the Referendum

PCRM representatives handing out and leaflets calling to vote against the referendum were detained in Soroca. “Interior Minister Efros, when he learnt that Vladimir Voronin wanted to talk to him, immediately switched off all the phones,” the PCRM said. The representatives of the political party claim that “no clear explanations have been received from the police officers for this behavior that goes far beyond the Electoral Code”. “Some inane bleating about the leaflets being allegedly illegal. This nonsense was resolved by a simple call to the printing house, whose director confirmed that the print run had been officially ordered and paid for from the relevant account. Especially since each leaflet has the initial data of the printing house on it,’” the party said. The PCRM described the actions of the Soroca police officers as “particularly cynical”. “One of the agitators, an elderly man aged 81, a member of the Party of Communists, was subjected to a humiliating search and interrogation. His phone and money were taken away from him. The money was not much - only about 140 lei. The angry oppressors in uniforms demanded his confession that he was campaigning against the referendum for payment. According to the perverted logic of these bent cops, a man of age cannot participate in campaign events for free,” the party said in a statement. The PCRM campaigners were detained in the police station for several hours, “during which they were subjected to humiliation and abuse”. They were then released, but the leaflets were never returned. “We assume that there will be many such cases. The ultra-right dictatorial regime formed in our country, possibly based on sociological polls, understands perfectly well that the fate of the referendum, which should ‘push through’ Sandu into a second presidential term, hangs by a single thread. What happened in Soroca is an obvious manifestation of panic. Over time, the authorities’ hysteria will only increase. The goal is simple - to intimidate those who dared to oppose the referendum, which is dangerous and fraught with the most tragic consequences for the Constitution and the statehood of the country,” PCRM says. The party also recalled that the public company Teleradio-Moldova refused to broadcast a promotional video with an address by the third Moldovan President Vladimir Voronin. “Thus, it carried out an obvious act of censorship. This is the first time such a thing happens in our ‘pro-European’ country. Campaigning has always been the responsibility of the campaigners, and the role of the media has been limited to publication and broadcasting. Today, petty and thieving officials appointed by the ruling party decide what opposition politicians have the right to say in the public space and what they do not. They are shutting our mouths so that people do not learn the truth about the real motives for holding the referendum. For the sake of keeping their plum job and implementing their destructive plans for the Moldovan state, they are ready to do anything, up to and including the complete destruction of democracy in the country, of which there is already nothing left. But we will not be cowed! The hysterical resistance of the Sandu regime only gives us strength and motivation,” the PCRM stated.