MOLDOVAN PARLIAMENT REJECTS PRESIDENTIAL CONTROL OF SECURITY MINISTRY.

The Moldovan parliament on December 22 voted by a large majority to reject the amendments proposed by president Mircea Snegur to the law on state security. The amendments had sought to give the president the power to appoint and dismiss the State Security Ministry’s senior officials and to determine that ministry’s budget, organizational structure, and operating rules. The parliament had voted October 31 to give those prerogatives to the cabinet of ministers. Snegur declined to sign the parliamentary amendments into law, countering instead with his own amendments. Now that the parliament has reconfirmed its October 31 amendments in a second vote, the president is required by the constitution to sign them into law. (17)

The parliament and government are resisting the president’s campaign to expand his powers at their expense. Snegur would need to control the State Security Ministry before risking any open bid to dismiss the government and dissolve the parliament, as some of his advisers recommend, in order to ensure his reelection in 1996. The parliament and government are both dominated by the Agrarian Democratic Party, target of a vitriolic campaign by Snegur’s recently founded personal party.

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