Moldova recently made headlines as the country finally achieved EU candidate status alongside neighbouring Ukraine. Despite this, the country and its pro-EU government still face a great number of internal and external challenges on the way to further socio-economic success.

Politics in Moldova is on the edge of a perpetual crisis. It will be up to a new democratically minded generation to turn the trend.

On December 6th many citizens in Moldova attended protests in order to show their support for President-elect Maia Sandu. This was in response to a new and unofficial coalition in parliament that is now attempting to restrict the new president’s powers and push through a series of controversial laws.

The future of Moldovan politics will depend on Maia Sandu's ability to consolidate forces in the parliament. Changes in the standings of certain oligarchs is also bound to have an impact.

The challenger Maia Sandu and the incumbent Igor Dodon will go head-to-head in a second round of the Moldovan presidential election on November 15th.

For the time being, Machiavellian principles dominate Moldova’s foreign policy. With pressure from the European Union targeting the rule of law and the need to find material benefits, the current Moldovan ruling elite is heading to the widest doors.

Since the first days of independence in 1991, the political class in Moldova has chosen to tie the country’s foreign policy to a bifurcated East-West orientation. This is reflected in the state’s governance as leaders constantly search for quick fixes from the outside. Thus, this geopolitical oscillation has become a modern Moldovan political tradition with the foreign policy dichotomy as a sort of "trademark" used to quickly interpret, not always accurately, public perceptions or the conduct of the political parties by observers both at home and abroad.

Despite a brief moment of hope at the end of last year, Moldova continues to experience a period of instability which goes back to 2014. The institutions remain weak and are influenced by the politicians. Their autonomy is on paper only, justice is highly politicised and the economy is in poor shape. Unfortunately the outlook remains grim.

The Republic of Moldova has had its fair share of turmoil over the last several years. After a few years of positive developments on the path towards European integration, the trend reversed in 2014 when three of the country’s biggest banks had been robbed of about one billion dollars, or about one-eighth of the country’s GDP. In a matter of just one month, both the public outrage and the fall of the local currency that followed wiped out the five years of effort that culminated with the association of the Republic of Moldova with the European Union, the signing of the Deep and Comprehensive Free Trade Agreement with the EU and the adoption of a visa-free regime for travel to the EU. Moldova’s political life has stood under the sign of the events of 2014 ever since.

Since 2009, Moldova’s ruling elite have primarily based their political narratives on pro-European integration. Events that have unfolded in 2018, however, have made the continuation of this course nearly impossible.

In September 2018 Vladimir Plahotniuc, the leader of Moldova’s ruling Democratic Party and the most powerful oligarch in the country, announced that his party was set to change political course. Up until then, it had been the most important pro-European political force in Moldova. However, while preparing for the 2019 February parliamentary elections, it became a “pro-Moldovan” party. To many commentators this announcement was interpreted as a future turn towards Russia.

In recent months, the Moldovan parliament passed two bills which aim to change the country’s electoral system. It now seems ever more likely that Moldova will adopt a mixed electoral model and increase the chances of Vlad Plahotniuc, an oligarch (who is the wealthiest and most influential man in Moldova) and leader of the biggest pro-European party in the ruling coalition, to stay in power after the planned 2018 parliamentary elections. Time and again, Plahotniuc has found support from his formal rival – the leader of the pro-Russian socialists, President Igor Dodon.

On October 30th 2016, a presidential election was held in Moldova. Igor Dodon from the pro-Russian Party of Socialists of the Republic of Moldova (PSRM) received 47.98 per cent of the vote in the first round, while the pro-Western candidate, Maia Sandu from the Action and Solidarity Party (a newly founded, centre-right and pro-Western party), received 38.71 per cent. The third candidate – pro-Russian Dumitru Ciubasenco from Our Party, received 6.03 per cent of the vote. The remaining six candidates received insignificant support from the voters. The turnout was 49.18 per cent of the eligible voters.