“Gang Sandu to gruel!”: A protest tent camp has appeared in the center of Chisinau
The largest protest rally since Maia Sandu and her Action and Solidarity party came to power took place in Chisinau on Sunday. More than 40 thousand people took part in the mass event organized by the Shor party, the most active opposition force in Moldova.
The protesters chanted: “Down with Maia Sandu!”, “We exchange Sandu for firewood!”, “Gang Sandu for gruel!” The posters held by the demonstrators read: “Let’s keep ourselves warm at the protests!”, “Down with the Sand Power!”, “Washington is not our capital!” There were no party symbols - only state flags of the Republic of Moldova. And only one of the participants held the USSR flag.
Party leader Ilan Shor, who is in forced political exile in Israel, said via video link that similar protests will be held every Sunday until the government resigns. According to him, more than 10 thousand people were unable to come to the protest due to the obstacles that the authorities put in their way. The leader of the political formation announced that 100 thousand people would soon come out to protest, and in a month people would get rid of the “scoundrels from the ruling party.”
“We have two options: fall to our knees or fight to the end. We will go to the end. We will protest until fair early parliamentary elections are held. I announce that from today we will organize large-scale protests every Sunday until we achieve resignation and early elections,” said Ilan Shor.
Protesters in the crowded space between the presidential palace and the parliament building (they are located opposite each other, separated by the central street of Chisinau - Stefan the Great Boulevard, former Lenin Avenue) began to set up tents. At first ten tents were erected, then their number increased to forty. Protesters called this makeshift tent camp “Change Town.” The Ministry of Internal Affairs sent police and special forces to liquidate the tent city.
At the moment, when these lines are being written, negotiations between protest leaders and police representatives are underway. Despite pressure from the security forces, the protesters refused to leave the “small town of change” that they established near the parliament building. The protesters only agreed to remove the tents from the roadway, unblocking traffic along Stefan the Great Boulevard.
The protest of the Shor party was unexpectedly supported by several representatives of the Socialist Party. The ex-president of the country, former leader, and now honorary chairman of the PSRM, Igor Dodon, who is under house arrest, called on all his supporters to go to all protests against the regime of Maia Sandu, regardless of who organizes these protests. The protest action was also supported by MP from the PSRM, political scientist and TV presenter Bogdan Tirdea, who throughout the day posted news from the scene on his Telegram channel.
Another member of parliament from the Socialist Party, Alexander Sukhodolsky (former vice-mayor of Comrat and vice-speaker of the People's Assembly of Gagauzia), also spoke out in support of the protest organized by the Shor party.
“Now we are not talking about someone’s political ambitions, but about the survival of the people. The majority of our citizens will not only not be able to pay for gas and heating this winter - they will have nothing to eat! And those in power are trying to pit people against each other. Therefore, all the talk that there is no need to go to protests because they are held by this or that party is a provocation of the authorities against the people,” Sukhodolsky noted in a commentary for the Sputnik Moldоva agency.
However, the new leadership of the Party of Socialists, headed by the chairman of the executive committee, vice-speaker of parliament Vlad Batryncha, seemed to have taken in water. The current leaders of the PSRM did not make a single comment in connection with the protest and the creation of a tent city. The Socialist leadership does not want to be on par with the Shor party due to the fact that the leader of this party was sentenced to seven years in prison (although his case is still in the Appeals Chamber and the final verdict has not been rendered).
It is strange that the socialists did not care with the same zeal about their moral purity when they entered into alliances with the openly anti-Russian ACUM bloc and the Democratic Party, when they voted for the pro-Romanian Minister of Education, for honoring the punitive forces who fought in Transnistria in 1992, when they lent their shoulder Sandu in February of this year when they declared a state of emergency.
Today it has become completely clear: the socialists have completely lost their leadership positions on the left flank of the party under the leadership of Ilan Shor. And it doesn’t matter at all for what reasons they did it. Today there is only one opposition party on the left flank - the Shor party.
Apparently, the authorities will try with all their might to prevent the protest town. Attempts will be made to liquidate the tent camp and ban the activities of the Shor party, which will indicate the helplessness of the authorities in the face of the protest wave. There will be calls for Romania to introduce police forces into Moldova. And then local, presidential and parliamentary elections will easily be cancelled. However, in this case, there is a fairly large risk that protests will cover entire regions (Gagauzia will not be the last), and the confrontation will enter a hot phase.
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