PAS Wins a Parliamentary Majority

Despite massive interference, Moldova will continue towards Europe

On Sunday September 28th Moldovans went to the polls at home and around the world and voted decisively to continue the country’s European path.

With 100% of the vote counted PAS won 50.2% of ballots cast. The second place party was the Patriotic Bloc with 24.17%. Here are the top 6 parties:

Screenshot from the CEC website

This means that 5 parties will enter parliament - PAS, the Patriotic Bloc, the Alternative Bloc, “Our Party” (Renato Usatii) and the “Democracy at Home” party (PPDA). Here is a projection of the parliamentary seats distribution from Newsmaker:

With 55 seats PAS will have a solid parliamentary majority and will be able to form a government.

What is PPDA?

Democracy at Home (PPDA)’s result is for sure the most surprising element of this election. No polls showed them as a real contender. I mentioned them briefly in my “Who I’m Watching in the Parliamentary Elections” article because Vasile Costiuc, the PPDA party leader, is George Simion’s man in Chisinau.

PPDA is a unionist party that has closely aligned itself with the “sovereigntist” political movement. Vasile Costiuc founded the party in 2011 and PPDA never got close in the 2014, 2019 and 2021 parliamentary elections.

Senior political figures from Plahotniuc’s Democratic Party (PDM) have publicly stated that Vasile Costiuc was financed by Plahotniuc and used as a “kind of spoiler” by the oligarch. Costiuc rejects these claims.

In June Costiuc traveled to Washington DC and met with 3 US Congressmen, Anna Paulina Luna (R-FL), Andy Ogles (R-TN) and Robert Aderholt (R-AL). He claimed that he delivered the message that Moldova is not a democracy and that PAS is censoring its opponents. Meetings with the MAGA congressmen underline his position in Europe where he has closely aligned with Simion’s AUR party and the MEGA movement.

Vasile Costiuc and PPDA campaigned for a “Yes” vote in last year’s referendum, but has since appeared onstage alongside Shor figures such as Victoria Furtuna at the MEGA conference in Chisinau.

Where did their vote come from?

Vasile Costiuc has built up a large audience over many years with online live-streamed videos. Recently he has had massive reach on TikTok. In August the Romanian think-tank Expert Forum published an analysis showing that in 1 week videos with the hashtag #vasilecostiuc saw a 300% increase in reach and got over 1 million views.

Commentators and experts currently speculate that Simion’s TikTok operation backed Costiuc. He may also have gotten a boost from Shor’s network once Victoria Furtuna’s Moldova Mare party was removed from the race. Right now these are simply theories, there will likely be more information in the coming days.

The Diaspora Vote - Decisive but More Split

This election saw record turnout in the diaspora with the largest number of voters in a parliamentary election. Higher turnout was only recorded previously for Maia Sandu’s second round presidential election. At the same time, the PAS vote share in the diaspora fell from 86% in the 2021 parliamentary elections to 78.6% now.

The main beneficiaries of this drop were Renato Usatii and PPDA.

Reactions to the Result

Congratulations to Moldova and President Sandu came in from numerous European leaders, including this strong statement from President of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen:

Screenshot from X

French President Emanuel Macron wrote:

“ Despite attempts at interference and pressure, the choice of the people of the Republic of Moldova has been forcefully asserted. France stands with Moldova in its European project and in its drive for freedom and sovereignty,”

and Ukrainian President Volodomyr Zelenskyy wrote:

“I was happy to congratulate Maia on this very important victory and wish her success.

“These elections have shown that Russia’s destabilizing activity is losing ground, while Moldova is gaining ground in Europe. Russian subversion, constant disinformation - none of this worked. It is important that Moldova effectively defended itself against threats, together with all those who helped it,”

At the time of writing the US Embassy has made no statement on the results.

PAS leader and Speaker of Parliament Igor Grosu thanked the voters and hailed this major victory saying:

“PAS has a parliamentary majority, a pro-European majority only because you gave us this trust and this chance. A second chance, I would say, because we know and understand that many did not vote for the party, but for the European future of the country and to protect the country from a pro-Russian majority”

It was an extraordinarily difficult battle. The Russian Federation threw everything it had into the battle - tons of money, tons of lies, tons of illegalities. It used criminals to turn our entire country into a space of criminality. It filled everything with hatred.

We came to the fight with what is most sacred to us - the people. People with high heads, with dignified hearts and with great love for their people. To you, dear people, we thank you!” (…)

“All of Europe, everyone now knows that Moldovans are not only a hardworking people, but a fearless, smart and dignified people,”

Alternative Bloc leaders Ion Ceban and Alexandr Stoianoglo also thanked their voters and hailed a democratic outcome.

Irina Vlah and Igor Dodon did not. Vlah called the results proof that Moldova is no longer a democracy. Dodon called on all opposition parties to join in a protest “without party flags.” He made numerous statements throughout the weekend alleging that PAS was rigging the election and that any result that did not see the opposition come to power would be proof of rigging. No other parties responded to his call to protests and only Patriotic Bloc members, and Igor Dodon and Vasilie Tarlev, attended the rally.

Police warned that protestors were being offered €150 euros to come to the protest plus a €50 bonus if they “bring a friend.” This was confirmed by Newsmaker who published correspondence from organizers promising these payments. The Socialists deny paying protestors.

The protest was moderate in size and quite predictable. The same speakers and the same protestors as usual for a Socialist gathering. No violence or provocations. After some speeches the leaders sent the crowd home.

Interference on Election Day

While most voters were able to cast their ballots without interference, many many issues occurred during the election. There were bomb threats called in against polling station in Brussels, Rome, Genoa (Italy), Bucharest, Asheville (USA) and Alicante (Spain). Embassies and polling places had to be evacuated and checked by the police delaying some votes. The Rîbnița-Rezina and Sănătăuca–Camenca bridges over the Nistru saw long lines of cars coming from Transnistria as police and emergency services had to periodically stop traffic and respond to bomb threats against the bridges. There were also many bomb threats against polling places inside the security zone.

Kremlin propaganda also didn’t take the day off with lots of fake videos circulating purporting to show election rigging efforts in favor of PAS. Videos of alleged poll workers burning ballots stamped for the Patriot Bloc and similar efforts tried to call the results into question.

Promolex election observers reported an “unprecedented” number of cases where ballot secrecy was violated - either by people taking photos, or other methods. This is an indication of voter bribery but we don’t yet know how big a role bribery played in this election.

In Iasi Romania, a man released a tear gas grenade inside a polling place. Luckily, no one was injured and he was arrested.

ZdG reported on a new undercover investigation where their reporters and sources exposed a new Kremlin operation targeting diaspora polling places. Advertisements promised €300-500 euros per day for people willing to become “election observers.” They were also promised bonuses up to €30,000 euros if they could provide videos showing ballot stuffing or election rigging in the diaspora. These “observers” were equipped with body cameras and tasked with counting voters and monitoring the voting stations from outside. Moldova’s Ambassador to Greece confronted one such man in a video recording outside the polling station in Athens. The man had stood there since 6 am and refused to tell who he worked for or share any details of his mission. When pressed, he admitted that the vote seemed to be proceeding without any issues.

ZdG discovered that one of the organizers of this effort was a Moldovan living in Germany named Gheorghe Zablodschi. He regularly posts rabidly anti-PAS and pro-Russian information on his facebook and he is known to be a personal friend and political supporter of the disgraced journalist Natalia Morari and her partner, fugitive oligarch Veaceslav Platon. Another organizer of the network was former police officer Serghei Medic, who was recently seen in Iasi setting up an illegal call center there in support of the Patriotic Bloc. ZdG tracked the digital infrastructure behind this project to a sanctioned Kremlin cyber operations group.

A Historic Result

In spite of all of these challenges, Moldova voted in an election that, by all indications, was free and fair. A single party gaining a parliamentary majority for a second time is unprecedented. In the face of massive interference efforts, Moldovans went to the polls and chose a future in Europe. It was a decisive result for the country’s European aspirations and a major defeat for Moscow.

We’ll come back in the coming days with more analysis of the results and what they mean.