Marginal Moldovan Political Parties Merge. Bet on the

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 03 CHISINAU 001393 SIPDIS SENSITIVE SIPDIS STATE FOR EUR/UMB E.O. 12958: N/A TAGS: PGOV KDEM PREL PINR MD SUBJECT: Marginal Moldovan Political Parties Merge. Bet on the Center Left's Potential. Sensitive But Unclassified. Please Protect Accordingly. REFS: A) Chisinau 1380, B) Chisinau 1235, C) Chisinau 0167, D) 06 Chisinau 1083 ¶1. (SBU) Summary: In preparation for 2009 parliamentary elections, marginal political parties are merging to increase the vote bank of the ideologically like-minded. One center-left, social-democratic alliance has potential. One centrist agreement adds marginally to centrist strength, which is now threatened by an upstart. One pro-Russian, leftist alliance has no hope. End summary. Center-Left Social Democrats: Only 10% Combined... -------------- -------------- ¶2. (SBU) Three center-left social democratic parties signed a June agreement to cooperate at all levels, from village to Parliament. They are: Dumitru Braghis's Party of Social Democracy of Moldova (PDSM),which won an average of 4.7% of the vote in June's nationwide town, district and city council elections; Eduard Musuc's Social Democratic Party of Moldova (PSDM),which took 3.6% of the vote; and Mihai Petrache's Centrist Union (UCM),which took 1.5%. The parties plan to merge in 2008, and will probably be called some version of social democratic. The alliance can now claim 97 of 1,122 city and district (raion) councilors. The PDSM has 46, the PSDM 36, and the UCM 15. These figures put the alliance in fifth place for number of councilor numbers, just behind the 116 belonging to the Democratic Party (PD) and the 98 belonging to the Christian Democrats (PPCD). These parties run far behind the Communist Party (PCRM),with 465 councilors and the Our Moldova Alliance (AMN),with 220 councilors. None of the three allying parties is yet represented in Parliament, but Braghis sits there as an independent. ...But Potential for Horse-Trading and Communist Defectors -------------- -------------- ¶3. (SBU) The new alliance's combined vote of 9.8% in 2007 elections doesn't look like much, but could play a significant role in 2009 parliamentary horse-trading. (Note: The party leaders have experience already. It was Braghis and Musuc whose deals with the Liberal Party broke the deadlock in the Chisinau Municipal Council election for chairman-ref B. End note.) The potential for horse-trading will rise if 2009 elections see a further erosion of PCRM votes, or even a split in the party; the PCRM's vote share dropped from 46% to 34% between nationwide local-body elections in 2003 and those held in 2007. It is too early to tell whether the younger, more modern leaders of the PCRM will break away to create an alternative social-democratic grouping. The Bragis-Musuc alliance would be a natural refuge for PCRM voters who are dissatisfied with what they see as the Soviet attitudes and cronyism of the ruling party, despite its generally good record in getting salaries paid and roads paved, but who support market controls and strong social-welfare policies. Social Democratic Leadership Advantages -------------- ¶4. (SBU) In addition, the social-democratic alliance has the advantage of attractive leadership. Braghis is a former Prime Minister, and one of the few politicians who campaigns with enthusiasm and smiles in Moldova (ref C). Musuc is young (31) and informed; in a meeting with us, he laid out the alliance's platform for Moldova as a neutral state integrated into Europe, with citizenship based on civic rather than ethnic identity. He favored the election of judges, spoke positively of the minority Bassarabian Orthodox Church ("fewer KGB guys"),and discussed the possibility of a Transnistrian solution based on shared commercial interests, reasonable compromise, and exploitation of the differences between Transnistria's "president" and its legislature. Musuc also has the advantage of the martyr's crown: he spent 47 days in jail on charges of embezzlement (ref D) and was vindicated on November 6, when the European Court of Human Rights cited the illegality of his detention and the state's lack of evidence. The ECHR awarded him USD 17,000 (12,000 Euros) for violation of his right to freedom and safety. Center Coalesces to Form Parliamentary Alliance -------------- -- ¶5. (SBU) Unlike the social democrats, whose three-way alliance increases their individual weights significantly, the centrist Social Liberal party (PSL) and Democratic Party (PD) alliance has only marginally increased the combined strength of the two parties. In October, they formed a parliamentary alliance that joins the PD's seven MPs (down from eight after MP Vladimir Filat defected) to the PSL's three. This union created a ten-member bloc in the 101-seat unicameral Parliament. This bloc is the same size as the PPCD's faction, but behind the 16 Our Moldova Alliance (AMN) seats and the CHISINAU 00001393 002 OF 003 PCRM's 56. If this centrist alliance, as expected, extends beyond Parliament, the PD's average 10.1% of the nationwide vote in June would join the PSL's 3.3% to form a potential vote bank comparable to that of the social-democratic alliance. PD and PSL Not Naturally Allied, Have Low Growth Potential -------------- -------------- ¶6. (SBU) Also in contrast to the social democrats, the PD-PSL alliance looks less natural and has less potential for growth. The PSL President, MP Oleg Serebreanu, is a tweedy, professorial type. He is pro-Romanian and publicly enamored of the conspiracy theory that the USG pushed Moldovan parliamentarians to join in sufficient numbers with the PCRM to elect Vladimir Voronin President in 2005. PD's President Dumitru Diacov, born in 1952, was a "Pravda" newspaper reporter and Komsomol Central Committee advisor in the mid-1980s, and is reported to be on good terms with the PCRM. Diacov described to us the 11-year history of his party and its role as the most stable centrist party in a conversation with us. He cited the PSL's contribution as a "well-structured, intellectual" ally, and noted that there were no essential contradictions between the two parties. Like Musuc, but unlike his own ally Serebreanu, Diacov favored neutrality. He also supported a Moldovan position that was neither pro-Russian nor pro-Romanian. He said that he was in favor of the Musuc-Braghis alliance, as a consolidation of center-left forces. ¶7. (SBU) The PD-PSL alliance appears to have little potential for growth. The AMN, with 19.6% of the June 2007 nationwide vote and 16 parliamentarians, is the big kid on the centrist block. Moreover, the AMN's leader, MP and former Chisinau mayor Serafim Urechean, has the sort of self-esteem that would doom any sort of alliance with the equally proud Diacov. Centrist Stand-alone: Filat's New Party -------------- ¶8. (SBU) Diacov also suffered the loss of an influential party member, MP Vladimir Filat, on October 8, only 11 days before the PD-PSL alliance was formed. Filat, who took fourth place in the June 3 first round for Chisinau mayor, ran a youth-oriented, high-tech campaign featuring YouTube spots. He contrasts sharply with his more-traditional former boss Diacov. Filat's new party, the Liberal Democratic Party of Moldova (PLDM),implicitly damns Diacov as old school and corrupt by touting the PLDM as the refuge for "new and non-corrupt people of modern democratic outlooks." When we asked Filat why he wanted to buck the trend of alliances by creating a new split, he replied that his party, which will be constituted officially at a December 10 convention in Chisinau, has already attracted 20,000 signed-up members. He stated his party had the support of mayors and councilors (mostly independents and liberals of various sorts) in all raions, who would ally themselves with Filat's PLDM after December 10. Filat noted that these officials were not involved in politics before. He expected the bulk of his supporters to come from those who are willing to commit themselves to a pro-NATO, Euro-Atlantic center-right party that is run by the members and not from the top. And, the No-Hopers on the Left -------------- ¶9. (SBU) In September, Patria-Rodina, a leftwing pro-Russia party that took 1.5% of the vote in June's elections, united with the Patria-Moldova organization of Moldovan guest workers in Russia to form the Patria-Moldova Party. Former Patria-Rodina President Gheorghe Sima, now vice-president of the new party, visited us to complain that his alliance had not been approved by the Ministry of Justice (MOJ). Sima claimed that the MOJ's decision, ostensibly based on the lack of necessary documents, was a smokescreen for President Voronin's desire to crush all opposition on the left, especially leftists who criticize economic and social conditions in Moldova. Comment -------------- ¶9. (SBU) Comment: Political party consolidation in Moldova remains minimal for now. The centrist AMN, with its 20% vote bank, is unlikely to unite with its rough ideological counterpart, the PD-PSL alliance. Filat's new party, despite Filat's claim of attracting the previously uninvolved, will grow mostly at the expense of the other centrist parties. The PCRM, by holding on to the Communist brand name and maintaining its reputation for efficient governance, appears to have kept the loyalties of 35-40% of the electorate. It is also prepared to play fast-and-loose with the rules in elections, when no one is watching, as happened in the November 11 repeat elections in Rezina (ref A). The right-wing PPCD has tarnished its image by its 2005 alliance with the PCRM. The social democratic CHISINAU 00001393 003 OF 003 center-left, which is in tune with much of voter thinking and inclination, has the best potential for growth. End comment. Kirby