Electoral system for national legislature

Republic of Moldova, Electoral Code (No. 1381-XIII of 21.11.1997, last amended by Law No. 162 of 20.07.2020), [unofficial translation], accessed 14 July 2021

Article 1. General Terms

[...] National Constituency – a national level constituency within which Parliamentary elections are organized and held on the basis of proportional representation on political party lists; [...]

Article 79. Parliamentary Elections

(1) The Parliament shall be elected for a four-year term by a universal, equal, direct, secret and freely expressed suffrage.

(2) Elections to Parliament shall be conducted based on one national electoral district in which 101 deputies shall be elected.

Article 94. Setting Representation Threshold

(1) Upon receiving, from all district electoral councils, the protocols with the votes counting results from all districts, the Central Electoral Commission shall tabulate the number of valid votes cast for each party, other socio-political organisations, every electoral bloc and independent candidate, in order to establish whether or not they have reached the minimal threshold to be represented in Parliament.

(2) The minimum threshold of representation represent the following proportions of valid votes cast for the country as a whole:

a) for a party or socio-political organisation – 5 per cent;

b) for an electoral bloc – 7 per cent.

c) for an independent candidate – 2 per cent.

(3) Parties, other socio-political organizations, electoral blocs and independent candidates that received fewer votes than the percentage provided in paragraph (2) are eliminated from the procedure of mandate assignment by a decision of the Central Electoral Commission.

Article 95. Counting the Mandates obtained by the Electoral competitor

(1) The number of mandates obtained by each competitor is calculated by the Central Electoral Commission by successively dividing the number of valid votes given to each competitor, besides independent candidates, with 1,2,3,4 etc., up to the figure that corresponds to the number of seats established for the Parliament.

(2) From the results of all the divisions and the number of valid votes cast for independent candidates, it should be selected in descending order as many numbers as there are seats to be allocated. The number  if the mandates assigned to each party, other socio-political organisation, or electoral bloc is equal to the quantity of numbers obtained from the row by the above-mentioned entities.

(3) Independent candidate is considered elected if the number of valid obtained votes represents at least two per cent from the valid votes given across the country.

Article 96. Assigning MPs seats

(1) The Central Electoral Commission shall assign the seats to candidates in line with the order in which they have been recorded in the lists.

(2) Candidates included in the lists of electoral competitors that surpassed the representation threshold

referred to in Article 94, but have not been elected shall be declared as alternates. An alternate shall be declared as elected by the Constitutional Court, upon the request of the Central Electoral Commission, if, due to certain reasons, a seat belonging to a political party, to other social and political organization or to an electoral bloc becomes vacant. The alternate may refuse the offered seat, having filed a written application with the Central Electoral Commission to this end.

(3) If a political party, other socio-political organization or an electoral bloc has obtained a number of seats that exceeds the number of candidates included in the list, this political party, socio-political organization or electoral bloc shall receive a number of seats that is equal to the number of candidates included in the list.

(4) The remaining seats shall be assigned to other political parties, socio-political organisations or electoral blocs in the manner referred to in Article 95 (1). This procedure shall be applied as well when MP vacancies occur and the electoral competitor has no alternates or if became vacant the MP mandate obtained by an independent candidate.