Translated material
Transnistrian minimum
The presidential race is headed by Igor Smirnov
Today in Transnistria the reception of signatures in support of candidates for the post of president of the unrecognized Transnistrian Moldavian Republic (PMR) officially ends. Elections are scheduled for December 10. As Lyudmila Grositskaya, secretary of the Central Election Commission of Transnistria, told Vremya Novostey, the first to pass the “candidate minimum” was the current president of the PMR, Igor Smirnov. On October 26, he submitted to the CEC the 9 thousand signatures required for registration, and after verification, only 73 of them were declared invalid.On November 3, Igor Smirnov was presented with a certificate of candidate for the post of President of the PMR. Together with him, the Minister of Internal Affairs Alexander Korolev received a candidate certificate, whom a number of observers consider to be Smirnov’s successor. The remaining contenders are the deputy of the Supreme Council of Transnistria, businessman Pyotr Tomaily, the secretary of the Transnistrian Communist Party, the editor of the newspaper Pravda Pridnestrovya Nadezhda Bondarenko and the editor of Novaya Gazeta, which strongly opposes the local authorities, Andrei Safonov. They submitted the necessary documents to the CEC one after another - on November 7, 8 and 9. The verification of their signature lists has not yet been completed.
As the leader of the “Equal Rights” movement of the Republic of Moldova, Valery Klimenko, noted to VN, the predictability of the results of the elections on December 10 is confirmed by the results of recent opinion polls, during which over 60% of Pridnestrovians declared support for the current president. There were rumors before the election that Mr. Smirnov was not eager to re-enter the race for the post he has held since 1990. The leader of Equality suggested that the current president decided to continue his work because he “saw the light at the end of the tunnel.” “Thanks to the strengthened support of Russia and the warmer political climate in neighboring Ukraine, a real chance has recently emerged to solve the problem of Transnistria, taking into account the interests of the Pridnestrovians. In these conditions, Igor Smirnov, who stood at the origins of the creation of the PMR, of course, had to stay to bring what he started to the end,” concluded VN’s interlocutor.