In 1996, Calev, then a manager of a trade firm, refused to pay the firm's taxes, obtained a false certificate declaring that his firm owed no taxes, and then closed the firm. Procurators discovered the fraud, but Calev managed to avoid trial by obtaining a document stating he had been a rescue worker at the Chernobyl nuclear-disaster site. According to an amnesty law, Chernobyl rescue workers are exempt from paying taxes. The document, however, proved to be fake. Moreover, last fall, Calev failed to inform Moldovan authorities that he had obtained Russian citizenship.
Moldovan law prohibits dual citizenship and the granting of public posts to foreign nationals.
Soon afterward, the former minister of transportation and communication, Tudor Leanca, whom Calev had replaced, was also charged with corruption. Leanca was arrested, on March 16, for allegedly extorting large sums of money from the privatization of the Moldova Hotel. The police raided the hotel, which is also the headquarters of the PDF newspaper, Mesagerul, and houses a firm headed by PDF member Valeriu Moraru. Party leaders claimed the accusations against its members were unfounded, arguing that Leanca was targeted because he had helped obtain the fifty-second and decisive vote to confirm the Sturza government. Two other prominent PDF members soon came under fire.