Less than two months after taking office, the Action and Solidarity Party has managed, through its staff policy and the order of changing the heads of key state institutions, to irritate lots of people and to attract all sorts of criticisms. It happens despite the fact that there is still one month before the one hundred days test expires, during which time many things can change. Will the Party correct its mistakes or, as some accuse them, they will continue ‘running wild’, increasingly encouraged by the fact that the Party holds a majority in Parliament, has the Presidency and the Government and can be absolutely unhindered in taking decisions.

The other day, in the studio of a TV station, President Maia Sandu explained this state of affairs: First: “We are at the stage of building the rule of law”, something you can only do with people you trust. Secondly: governance procedures are not a fixed thing and this process may undergo some changes and adaptations. And third: “Action and Solidarity Party takes responsibility for the activity of the new leaders, and if they do not meet the expectations of society, the party will pay with its own reputation …”

Let’s admit that Action and Solidarity Party will pay with its own reputation. What does this change for Moldova? And when will they pay? In four years, the period in which the bosses will do their own interests, just like others before them?

In 1998, the Moldovan Agrarian Democratic Party and Andrei Sangheli, their leader at the time, paid with their “own reputation” after ruining villages. In 2001, the Party of Democratic Forces and their president Valeriu Matei paid with reputation. In 2009, the Christian Democratic People’s Party, along with Iurie Roșca, also paid with their “own reputation”. In 2010, the Communist Party of Moldova, led by Vladimir Voronin, did the same. In 2019, the same thing happened with the Democratic Party of Moldova and its all-powerful leader Vlad Plahotniuc, and in 2021 the case was repeated by the Socialist Party and their president Igor Dodon …

None of these parties won the favor of the electorate after they disappointed the people or compromised and betrayed our national ideals. They and their leaders all paid with “their own reputation.” At what cost? All these leaders left their governing positions with their pockets full. These “reputations” of theirs valued nothing as they turned the main institutions of the state into casinos and gambling houses. These “reputations” of mafia gangs turned Moldova, which has everything to live differently, into a beggar of Europe, poor and desolate, which survives from loans.

The Action and Solidarity Party promised in the electoral campaign that they will change things for the better. The Party electorate (and not only) is waiting for the change, for a mafia-free, corruption-free Moldova, for a country free from any abuses, illegalities, and prejudices. “Our goal is to make order in this Parliament” – said Igor Grosu, interim president of Action and Solidarity Party at the first sitting of the Parliament. And one more thing: “people no longer want a Parliament that is a safe haven for those who break the law, a place where elites vote schemes and privileged contracts with the state, where iniquity is covered. People want state institutions to start working. They want a Parliament that makes laws for justice, rule, and discipline, a Parliament that has respect for citizens. We must build such a Parliament.” This is from the same speech of Igor Grosu. It’s a kind of manifesto of the Action and Solidarity Party government.

The Action and Solidarity Party undertook to do in four years what all the governments up to them had not done. The Party aims to revolutionize the system of government in Moldova. We cannot know whether their aim is achievable or not, given that the Party is so young, with no practical experience in administering state affairs and in the conditions of an acute shortage of staff. It is a precedent in Moldovan politics when a ruling party had to withdraw more than a quarter of its deputies in order to supply the necessary staff in the Government and other state institutions. It is a lesson not learned in time, which they try to recover on the go, not always in the most successful way, which is why it is pelted with black opposition balls. I do not see a problem in the fact that the opposition does not spare the Action and Solidarity Party.

This is true of the power authorities. One can see better from below what is happening on top, although normally it should be the other way round. Over the 30 years of Moldova’s existence, I do not remember parties that were applauded in government as much as in the election campaigns, except for the first Parliament and the first two Governments – Druc and Muravschi. .. In the Parliaments of Chișinău after 1994, you won’t find an Ion Ungureanu or an Ion Vatamanu, a Petru Soltan, a Leonida Lari, a Lidia Istrati, an Alexandru Moșanu, an Ion Dumeniuc, a Nadejda Brânzan, an Ion Borșevici or a Nicolae Dabija …

Nobody has done genuine politics in Moldova for a long time, and whatever we witness has nothing to do with politics.

Perhaps the Action and Solidarity Party is ready to take over and revive the spirit of the Moldovan parliamentary system of government from the early ’90s.