Igor Cristal Urges Moldova to Delay Territorial Reform Until After Elections

Igor Kristal: Redrawing constituencies less than a year before the elections contravenes the rules

The statutory amalgamation of local authorities should be postponed for at least one electoral cycle to avoid potential issues regarding constitutionality and breaches of European electoral standards.

Igor Cristal. Photo: IPN

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This statement was made by Igor Cristal, a legal expert at the Congress of Local Authorities in Moldova

(CALM), during a public discussion entitled ‘The administrative-territorial structure of Moldova: what the legislative package provides for and what proposals were formulated during the consultations’.

Postpone the merger of constituencies for one electoral cycle

According to the expert, changing electoral constituencies less than a year before local elections runs counter to the recommendations of the Venice Commission. “We propose postponing the merging of constituencies for at least one electoral cycle. This is because there is a risk that the provision concerning the merging of constituencies could be deemed unconstitutional.

– Furthermore, the Venice Commission’s Code of Good Practice in Electoral Matters clearly states that electoral legislation, including constituency boundaries, should not be amended within a year of an election. We are already past this deadline,” explained Igor Kristal.

The CALM expert warned that failure to comply with the Venice Commission’s recommendations could provide further ammunition to those opposed to local government reform. In his view, the authorities should allow the voluntary amalgamation process to continue, the mechanism for which is already provided for in the reform package.

Moving forward with voluntary amalgamation

“This means that we will not take into account best European practice and will play into the hands of the reform’s opponents. We insist on retaining what was proposed under the voluntary amalgamation procedure and continuing along the path of voluntary amalgamation,” said the expert.

Another argument he put forward concerns the constitutionality of the statutory amalgamation mechanism. According to Igor Kristal, the draft law transfers the power to make decisions on administrative-territorial reorganisation from local councils to central authorities, which, in his view, contravenes the provisions of the Constitution.

‘Due to the way in which the voluntary amalgamation procedure was terminated, as well as the lack of proper consultation—including the refusal to hold local referendums—the decision on territorial organisation was transferred from the remit of local communities to that of central authorities.

– In other words, local councils were deprived of their decision-making powers, as enshrined in the Constitution and the Charter of Local Self-Government (consultations with citizens on local issues of particular interest). “Everything was left to the discretion of the central authorities, the government and parliament, whilst the constitutional prerogatives of local communities were ignored,” explained the CALM expert.

This story was translated with the assistance of artificial intelligence.The translation was also reviewed by the Logos Press editorial team.

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