Coup in Gagauzia: anti-Russian forces seized power in the pro-Russian region
In the most famous of the pro-Russian regions of Moldova, Gagauzia, a pro-European parliamentary majority has emerged.
Deputies of the local People's Assembly have grouped themselves into the “Voice of Gagauzia” faction, are conducting a close dialogue with Western diplomats and are actively working on the “re-education” of the population, which still does not hide its sympathy for Russia
"Voice of Gagauzia"
The news about the formation of the “Voice of Gagauzia” faction went unnoticed in the Moldovan media. There was no official announcement about her appearance. For the first time, the faction “showed up” in negotiations with deputies of the Moldovan parliament on the division of powers between Gagauzia and the Republic of Moldova. Representatives of the “Voice of Gagauzia” gave comments to the pro-European Moldovan media and promised to prevent discussion of the conflict in Ukraine, as well as other “politicized issues” such as Chisinau’s decision to ban the St. George ribbon and symbols of the Russian military during the Ukrainian operation V and Z.
At the same time, representatives of “Voice” refrained from specifying how many deputies they have in their faction out of 35 members of the People’s Assembly and who is in charge. However, their latest statements explain the surprisingly mild reaction of the authorities and elites of Gagauzia to the most scandalous of the latest decisions of Chisinau. The People's Assembly only adopted a declaration asking the country's parliament to reconsider this decision.
“The People's Assembly of Gagauzia condemns the above decision of the Parliament of the Republic of Moldova and asks the deputies to abandon this idea in order to maintain stability in society,” the parliamentarians said in a statement.
The declaration was adopted before the meeting with the Moldovan deputies and does not contain any specifics regarding the response actions of the Gagauz parliamentarians if Chisinau ignores their demands.
Former pro-Russian
Gagauz autonomy is rightfully considered one of the most striking illustrations of Russian influence in Moldova. The population of the region speaks Russian, despite the bans from Chisinau, watches Russian television and in elections almost unanimously votes for political parties and politicians supported by Moscow. One of the main memes of the last presidential elections, “More people voted for Dodon in Gagauzia than for Kadyrov in Chechnya,” had a simple explanation: Dodon in the autonomy, by inertia, continues to be considered a pro-Russian politician supported by the Kremlin.
The business elite of Gagauzia, and these are mainly winemakers, have traditionally also tried to establish trade relations with Russia and the CIS. This came back to haunt us during the “wine wars” after the failure of the Kozak plan, during foreign policy disagreements between Chisinau and Moscow, Moldova’s announced course for European integration, and in many other cases. Despite this, in recent years, entrepreneurs have “stuck” with the people and helped pro-Russian parties win elections, or they themselves nominated themselves for elected positions on their behalf.
The latest such example is Irina Vlah, bashkan (head) of Gagauzia. She won the elections twice thanks to the direct support of the Russian Federation and, in general, demonstrated the vector of sentiments of the Gagauz elite.
However, soon after winning for the second time (and the last, she cannot be elected to this post again), her vector clearly turned in the wrong direction. Emissaries from the Romanian and American embassies helped turn the wheel in a new direction.
Diplomatic game
Diplomats from Bucharest and Washington have long been actively testing the waters in the “Gagauz direction.” However, they managed to achieve clear and loud successes in rapprochement with the Gagauz elites only in July 2019.
After the next elections of the Bashkan of Gagauzia, the then ambassadors of the United States and Romania, Derek Hogan and Daniel Ionita, held a series of meetings with both the executive branch of the “pro-Russian” autonomy and with legislators of the region.
As a result of the meetings, officially, Romanian and American authorities began to invest more in social and infrastructure projects in Gagauzia, and also put pressure on Chisinau to allocate resources for teaching the Romanian language in local schools. For her part, Bashkan Irina Vlah publicly recognized the state language of Moldova as “Romanian”, and not “Moldovan”, as written in the Constitution, and called on the residents of Gagauzia to actively study this Romanian.
Then she herself admitted that she was learning Romanian with a tutor. For the residents of the autonomy, in whose collective memory the memories of the atrocities of the Romanian fascist occupiers in the south of Bessarabia in 1941-44 are still alive, these statements were a shock.
After the elections to the People's Assembly in 2021, representatives of the “collective West” finally consolidated their success. As PolitNavigator managed to find out, not one, but two pro-European factions were formed in the Gagauz parliament. The first, already known to us, “Voice of Gagauzia,” consists of at least fifteen deputies and is unofficially headed by its speaker Dmitry Konstantinov.
The second, controlled by Irina Vlah, consists of about five or seven deputies. The apt calculation of the Western partners is that not a single political force has the majority in the People's Assembly necessary for independent decision-making at the local level. But all together they form a majority, a pro-Western majority, which will definitely not take any serious measures to counter the Chisinau bans on St. George ribbons and other symbols of sympathy for Russia.
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