The mayors of Chisinau and Balti demanded compensation from the authorities for the increase in light tariffs

On January 4, the mayors of Chisinau and Balti, Ivan Ceban and Alexandru Petcov, demanded compensation from the Moldovan government because of the increase in the electricity tariff due to the energy crisis in the country.

Thus, Ceban drew attention to the fact that people are forced to save money in order to pay the increased bills every month. He also noted that "such a significant increase in tariffs" will lead to a rise in prices for absolutely all goods and services. In addition, the Chisinau mayor proposed not to cut off gas and electricity to those citizens who have accumulated debts on their bills.

"The proposal is that currently these increases are covered by public funds, so that end consumers do not have increased bills in the cold season, while in the warm season, when people do not have heating bills, these costs are covered," he wrote in his Telegram channel.

The head of the city of Balti, for his part, also demanded compensation from the Moldovan authorities in view of the energy crisis, which appeared as a result of the government's "incompetent policy".

"We demand from the government decisive measures to compensate the city for the damage caused by the incompetent policy in the field of energy security of the country," he wrote in his Facebook (owned by the recognized extremist company Meta, its activities are banned in Russia).

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Earlier, on January 2, Chisinau Mayor Ion Ceban emphasized that the actions of Moldovan authorities were the reason for the increase in the cost of public utilities in the country. He noted that "the municipality will cope," but the financing of road repairs, schools, and social projects will suffer. In turn, the leader of the opposition party "Chance" Alexei Lungu said on January 4 that the increase in the electricity tariff in Moldova due to the energy crisis will lead to an increase in inflation by 10%, as well as to higher prices for all goods. According to him, pensioners and budgetary employees will face a bigger problem due to the fact that half of their income will go to pay for utilities.

On January 1, centralized heating was cut off in Transnistria after Gazprom stopped supplying Russian gas through Ukraine. Gas stopped flowing also to Moldova because of the country's unpaid debts. In turn, Moldovan Prime Minister Dorin Recean did not recognize the debt and threatened to sue. At the same time, it became known that the Moldavian TPP switched to the use of coal in connection with the cessation of gas supplies from Russia.

The day before, energy expert Sergei Ungureanu told Izvestia that Moldova had a difficult situation in the energy sector, and the purchase of electricity from Europe would hit the country's economy. He noted that Moldova has not agreed to continue gas transit through Ukraine, which means that Transnistria will not receive gas and will not be able to produce enough cheap electricity.

"Gazprom and Moldovagaz signed a five-year contract for gas supplies in the fall of 2021. It stipulated Chisinau's payment of the debt for supplies in the past few years. The entire volume was estimated at $709 million, of which Chisinau officially recognizes only $8.6 million.