Maia Sandu returns Moldovan citizenship to Traian Băsescu
Under Maia Sandu, the Moldovan passport increasingly looks less like a legal identity document and more like a personal certificate of favour, granted to those the president approves of and taken from those she does not.
Today, Sandu remembered that she approves of former Romanian president Traian Băsescu.Băsescu first received Moldovan citizenship in 2016 under Nicolae Timofti. Later, under Igor Dodon, his passport was revoked after the authorities ruled that the citizenship had been granted illegally.
Since then, Moldova’s citizenship rules have only become stricter. But, as we have already seen, Sandu sometimes has little patience for legal formalities. So the citizenship was simply restored, without much concern for earlier decisions.
“Mr Băsescu knows how much struggle took place on this land to preserve our identity, the Romanian language and liberation from the Soviet past, in order to move forward towards a European future,” the presidential website said.
Citizenship as political reward
This is not the first time Sandu has used citizenship as a political gesture. She has previously granted Moldovan citizenship to Russians out of favour with Moscow, including members of the band Bi-2 and film critic Anton Dolin, who has been designated a foreign agent in Russia.
At the same time, several residents of the Transnistrian region, even though they were born in Moldova, were stripped of citizenship by her decrees. That makes the Băsescu case especially revealing. For some, citizenship can be restored despite previous legal objections. For others, even birth in Moldova does not seem to offer full protection.
The strangest part of the story is what 74-year-old Băsescu now plans to do with Sandu’s gift.
