Moldovan Socialists to insist on presidential rule following parliamentary elections
CHISINAU. Jan 29 (Interfax) - The pro-presidential Party of Socialists of Moldova (PSRM) demand that the country switch to presidential rule, its leaders said at a press conference on Tuesday.
PSRM Executive Secretary and parliamentarian Vlad Batrincea said the party's first initiative following the elections will be amendments to the Constitution to switch to presidential rule.
"More than 800,000 citizens voted for Igor Dodon for president at the end of 2016. But since then, he has been practically isolated from the full performance of his duties owing to the efforts of the corrupt parliamentary majority and government. The PSRM believes we need to reinstate a top-down command system so that the president is responsible for everything that happens in the state," Batrincea said.
The president should be entitled to appoint the prosecutor general, the director of the Security and Intelligence Service, and judges, he said.
Parliamentarian Bogdan Tirdea gave a number of arguments in favor of switching to direct presidential rule.
One of the integral elements of a presidential republic is "the head of state's personal responsibility," Tirdea said.
"The personal responsibility of the top official for everything that happens in the country. This is not what we have now in Moldova. You never know who stole what: the authorities accuse each other. The Alliance for European Integration has been in power for nine years, but none of these characters has been held liable either the airport affair or for the stolen billion. The president would be responsible for everything in a presidential republic," Tirdea said.
Political stability is another advantage of presidential rule, he said.
"The government in the Republic of Moldova changes three times a day and is appointed twice a night. Who will say confidently whether these ministers will be in office in two minutes? Nobody. Third, the speed of making important decisions. Without the current thousands of bureaucratic delays and without endless discussions which, as a rule, end in nothing," Tirdea said.