CHISINAU, Nov. 14 (Xinhua) -- Over 1,000 young people gathered to protest in front of the Central Election Commission (CEC) in central Chisinau on Monday afternoon, expressing their disapproval over Socialist leader Igor Dodon being elected president and asking repeated elections.
With 100 percent of the votes cast in the Sunday runoff counted late Monday, Dodon polled 52.18 percent of the ballot, while the common right-wing candidate Maia Sandu got 47.82 percent.
The protesters gathered in the capital's central square and then moved along its main avenue to the CEC headquarters, requesting the dismissal of the CEC head and the foreign minister for obstructing the constitutional right of the citizens from diaspora to vote.
They also asked for rerunning of the elections, so as to ensure everyone's right to vote.
According to an earlier declaration of Sandu, the presidential runoff was neither correct nor free, the pro-European candidate accused that the foreign minister and the CEC chair are the main responsible for "the disaster" of insufficient polling stations and ballot papers due to which many citizens living abroad have failed to vote.
Sandu also announced on Monday that she intended to protest the results of the presidential runoff in the Constitutional Court.
In a response to these accusations, the CEC stressed in a release that the Moldovan ex-pats have to be blamed for the fact that insufficient number of polling stations was open abroad.
According to the CEC, voters had to take advantage of pre-registration to ensure that the authorities considered it necessary to open more polling stations.
"This is the main criteria for the opening of polling stations. And in this case, only 3,570 people pre-registered," said a CEC official.
The Foreign Ministry also came with the specifications that the Electoral Code establishes two basic requirements in identifying settlements for opening polling stations and namely the pre- registration of citizens residing abroad and number of voters who participated in previous elections.
The ministry said that the number of polling stations abroad for the current presidential elections is the highest established so far.
As for the ballot papers, the polling stations outside the country received 288,850 ones, of which 53 percent have not been used, although the ministry had made efforts to inform citizens about the list of opened polling stations and directing to the nearest polling stations.
Moldova held the presidential runoff on Sunday, as none of the nine candidates competing in the presidential race received an absolute majority of the votes in the first round of direct presidential elections on Oct. 30.
The presidential race marked the first time in 16 years that the country was electing its leader by national vote instead of having parliament select the head of state.
The presidential elections are generally viewed in the country as a battle between pro-Russian and pro-EU camps.
Landlocked between Romania and Ukraine, the former Soviet republic is still shrouded in the shadow of a corruption scandal in which about 1 billion U.S. dollars, or around 10 percent of the country's gross domestic product (GDP), disappeared from its banking system.
The scandal sparked large-scale protests last year, eroding confidence in pro-European politicians that have led the country since 2009 and has partially contributed to the Socialists' gain in popularity.
