Moldova parliamentary election - November 30, 2014

[Beagle]

And so, in the best 'second time as a farce' tradition, the photos posted on twitter are of the humongous lines for the polling stations in Moscow. And in the best Putin troll tradition, the photos posted online have been taken on the day prior to the election. I wonder if suddenly a lot of the Crimean pro-Russian activists have gotten an urge to participate in the Moldovan electoral process as well.

Anyway, turnout at this point is 2 points down compared to 2010, but it's still way above the 30% needed for the elections to be valid. No serious exit poll leaks, as far as I can tell.

[Beagle]

OK, turns out the reason for the lack of exit poll leaks is the lack of exit polls. They're not illegal or anything, it's just that nobody would pay for one.

Instead we get the first official results with 14% in:

Turnout ~ 55%

PCRM - 21,49%
PLDM - 16,75%
PL - 4,84 %
PD - 16,8%
PCR - 6,71%
PSRM - 22,72%
Blocul Uniunea Vamală - 4,55% (who are those?)
PLR - 1,25%

Obviously there results come from the pro-russian areas, but it still points to a somewhat stronger than expected result for the socialists, who will probably displace the commies as the leading pro-russian party.

I don't know if my understanding is correct, but it seems that while the Communists are pro-Russian in general, the Socialists are going all in for the Putin personality cult.

[Beagle]

40.5% in, but with no indication on the areas still out, it's impossible to say who has won:

PSRM - 22,8%
PCRM - 19,2%
PLDM - 17,8%
PD - 16,5%
PCR - 5,7%
PL - 6,9%

(threshold is 5% and there are ~25 parties below it)

[Beagle]

Oh, the PCR is the Communist Party of Reformers. Electoral slogan is "Against everyone who's been in power! Vote for the young team of reformers!". Program is absolute pie in the sky stuff*, but they seem to be natural junior partners in a Pro-Eurasian coaltion. That's if they get in, because as more votes come in from the pro-Western areas, they may yet fall below the threshold.

* Favorite bit of the program: "We'll provide every guest worker that comes back home the income he or she had abroad."

[Beagle]

Sorry, I misread something - threshold is indeed 6% (and higher for coalitions). This means that the PCR is certainly out, as they have been falling throughout. And with that, with 52.19% of the vote in, the pro-Europeans are ahead for the first time in the provisional seat count:


PSRM – 26
PCRM – 23
PLDM – 21
PDM – 20
PL – 11

[Beagle]

The thresholds: 6% for one party, 9% for two party alliances and 11% for three party alliances are mentioned in my OP.

Yep, hence the "indeed".

In other news, since the site of the electoral commission has been down for almost everybody, a live stream of the main live results page has been set up. With 66% in, it's showing:

PSRM: 21.93%
PLDM: 18.79%
PCRM: 18.35%
PDM: 16.12%
PL: 8.65%

You can see the vote for the Eurasian coalition falling almost in real time. At least according to one report I've read, it's virtually certain that the PSRM will finish first, but that PLDM will be second and that, provided they can keep the PL in line, the Pro-European coalition will have about between 53 and 56 of the 101 seats.

[Beagle]

77.52% in - but that's only just above 70% of the actual votes, since the outstanding precincts are those where the turnout has been highest.

In any case, the margin for the pro-European coalition should only increase in the late returns, so we know who won. The current seat count, which should be accurate ± 3:
PSRM - 26 seats
PLDM - 23 seats
PCRM - 21 seats
PD - 19 seats
PL - 12 seats

What's interesting is the number of invalid votes. Because of the late exclusion of the Patria party, they were on the ballot papers, but with a stamp saying "withdrawn" where the voter would mark their preference. The invalid votes are not only people who would cast an invalid Patria vote, of course, but even if we take every invalid vote and add it to the pro-Eurasian camp, they would still lose and Patria would not have made it in Parliament.

[Beagle]

Sorry to bump this, but it's interesting to me at least that the government formation took the better part of 3 months. The three pro-european parties did not end up forming a government together, so the new Moldovan prime minister is a certain Mr. Chiril Gaburici (LDP) - a 38 year old "unaffiliated" "techocrat".

The new government has the support of the LDP, the communists and the democrats.

Predictable, but depressing nonetheless...