Watches given to voters during elections in Moldova. Photo: Simion Ciochina

’Ghost’ voters, duplicate names on electoral rolls, bribes and threats. Investigative journalists Lilia Gurez and Igor Volnitchi left no stone unturned in their quest to uncover widespread electoral fraud during last year’s elections in Moldova

Helle Nordberg, IMS 

The Parliamentary elections in Moldova in July 2009 were so heavily tainted by acts of fraud that results were believed to have been influenced by 10 – 15 per cent. Despite general knowledge that fraud had prevailed during the first Parliamentary elections in April 2009 where the Communist Party won unexpectedly, no one had gathered the evidence to prove it.

When the decision was made to carry out a re-run of the elections in July 2009 following a stalemate in Parliament, journalists Lilia Gurez and Igor Volnitchi, who had both written about politics for years, decided it was their duty to investigate the truth. To finance their investigation of the July elections, they applied for support from the IMS-funded programme SCOOP which provides financial grants to investigative journalists in Southern and Eastern Europe and the Caucasus. According to Lilia Gurez, investigative journalism is not supported or developed in Moldova. Journalists have low salaries and media outlets seldom have the resources to finance a story that could take up to four months or more to research or write, .  

Dead people voting

Lilia Gurez and Igor Volnitchi began their investigation by visiting villages, talking to experts and observers and looking at electoral lists.

Speaking to IMS, Lilia Gurez said:

- We were a little scared while we were working on our investigation, traveling around to villages and looking at electoral lists. Many journalists have been threatened and not all Mayors of the villages we visited were happy to meet and talk.

In the course of their investigation, Lilia Gurez and Igor Volnitchi came across examples of where identities of dead people had been used increase the lists of voters. There were examples of ‘ghost’ voters, names of people that didn’t exist on random addresses and in some curious cases, addresses of certain political leaders. When Vlad Filat, Leader of the Liberal Democratic Party of Moldova and now Moldova’s Prime Minister came to the polling station he found that two strangers were registered on his address. He notified the electoral staff who dealt with it.

Further investigation also revealed that the names of people who were dead were reused in the July parliamentary elections despite the fact that these issues had come to light already during the first elections in April 2009. Local government, although obligated to renew electoral rolls, had not taken steps to improve the lists.

Dubious electoral techniques

The July 2009 Parliamentary elections in Moldova also saw examples of the same voter entered with different ID no less than 52 times on electoral lists in the capital Chisinau. Other examples of fraud included people casting votes on behalf of others. In Drochi town, Valentina Cebotari, observer team coordinator in Drochia, described how Mariana Bejan had found someone else’s signature next to her name.

Mobile voting was another means by which fraud was committed. The Moldovan legislation specifies that people who are physically disabled or cannot come to the polling station for other valid reasons can apply for mobile voting. However, according to the investigation, mainly representatives of the Communist Party claimed to act as advocates for this group of people, submitting their applications for mobile voting for them. The investigation showed that many of the people for whom Communist Party representatives had requested mobile voting, knew nothing about this.

250 lei and a glass of vodka

Lilia Gurez and Igor Volnitchi were told by sources at polling station no.56 in Cahul that people were taken to bars and offered drinks after having cast their votes in favour of the Communist Party. Some were offered 250 Lei ($24-25) and some had their jobs threatened by PRCM, according to the investigation. In a number of polling stations, electoral staff and observers were seen advising voters on who to vote and the unauthorised presence of individuals influencing voters such as that of Mayor Borzin Maria was recorded in Surcheceni. Some Mayors were even seen giving voters a ride to and from polling stations.

Investigating the truth

Although the investigation was published in 45 newspapers across Moldova, numerous online publications and blogs, there was no reaction from the Communist Party to the investigation. However, Lilia Gurez and her partner Igor have received awards from the likes of Transparency international and the Eurasia Foundation for their investigation of election fraud in Moldova. According to SCOOP.org, Lilia Gurez explained their work like this:  

- We never thought about prizes or awards. But we knew that we needed to show the truth about the parliamentary elections and the conditions under which they took place.[…]We do not know the real impact of the investigation, but we know for sure that now The Republic of Moldova has a democratically elected government and the Communists are now in opposition. Of course, we could not produce this investigation without Scoops support.

Read the full article by Lilia Gurez and Igor Volnitchi here.

About Scoop

Scoop is a support structure and network for investigative journalists in Eastern and South Eastern Europe and Caucasus. SCOOP brings together professional journalists from the region to share best practices and provides grants for investigative journalism.

Several investigations funded by SCOOP have won awards a.o.in Ukraine, Macedonia and Romania. SCOOP is funded by the Danish Neighbourhood programme and managed by the Danish Association of Investigative Journalism (FUJ) in cooperation with International Media Support. For more information about Scoop, see www.i-scoop.org.