How Much Did the Candidates for Moldova’s Presidential Elections Pay For a Vote?
In the first round of the presidential elections on November 1, the eight electoral contestants spent over 1 million euros. ZdG assessed how much the candidate for the president pays for one vote. We did so by comparing the number of election expenses in the financial reports submitted to the Central Electoral Commission (CEC) and the number of votes scored in the first round. The most expensive was Andrei Năstase’s vote, followed by Renato Usatii, the candidate with the highest reported expenses.
The data of the financial reports presented by the electoral contestants to the Central Electoral Commission show that Our Party’s candidate Renato Usatii spent the most money in the campaigning for the November 1 presidential elections – up to 500,000 euros. Igor Dodon follows him with 144,000 euros and Maia Sandu with about 134,000 euros. Andrei Năstase spent almost 109,000 euros while the candidate of the Șor Party Violeta Ivanov spent up to 100,000 euros.
Dorin Chirtoacă spent the least money in this election campaign with up to 1,000 euros. He also scored the fewest votes from the Moldovan citizens – 16,157 votes. Thus, Chirtoacă spent 0.05 euros (1.18 Moldovan lei) per vote.
The Dignity and Truth Party candidate Andrei Năstase spent the most for a citizen’s vote- about 2.5 euros (50 Moldovan lei), and 43,925 people voted for him.
Renato Usatii is the second in terms of the ratio expenses/votes scored – almost two euros and 227,938 people voted for him.
The winner of the first round of the presidential election, Maia Sandu, was backed by 487,635 citizens. Maia Sandu spent 0.3 euros (5.6 Moldovan lei) for each vote. The contender Igor Dodon who also moved into the second round, scored 439,866 votes, and each vote cost him 0.32 euros (6.54 Moldovan lei).
Candidate Maia Sandu scored 36.16% of the votes, followed by Igor Dodon, the independent candidate supported by the Socialists’ Party, with 32.61% of votes.
The second round of the presidential election, a run-off between Maia Sandu and Igor Dodon, is scheduled for November 15, 2020.