Damián Moya
The Honourable Damián Moya Cárbajal | |
|---|---|
 | |
| 75th Prime Minister of the Pacitalian Republic | |
| In office January 22, 2018 – December 9, 2024 Serving with Archonate Abeo Bamidele | |
| Deputy | Tomás de la Marques Jávier Grandinetti Virgínia Pracatan Sala Arnau Klüger Ferrer |
| Preceded by | Maurizio Conte (FPD) |
| Succeeded by | Italo Pavoni (PSDC) |
| Constituency | Pungaria-15 |
| Leader of the Democratic Nationalist Party | |
| In office 31st May 2016 – 29th June 2020 | |
| Preceded by | Cristián Piñera |
| Succeeded by | Position abolished |
| General Secretary of the Pacitalian Social Democratic Congress | |
| Assumed office 30th June 2020 | |
| Preceded by | Position created |
| Personal details | |
| Born | 12th November 1979 (age 45) Castillo Palancar, Marquería |
| Nationality | Pacitalian |
| Political party | Pacitalian Social Democratic Congress (2020-) |
| Other political affiliations | Democratic Nationalist Party (2007-2019) Pacitalian Social Congress (prior to 2007) |
| Domestic partner | Domenica Bracca (2019- ) |
| Alma mater | Archangel Beo University Universidad Comprensiva Marqueriana de las Artes (BA) University of Mandragora (JM) |
| Occupation | Lawyer |
| Cabinet | Pacitalian Executive Council |
| Salary | Đ 148,608 (2024) |
| Signature |  |
| Website | http://www.gov.pc/en/pm/ |
Damián Josep Moya Cárbajal, BA, JM, (born 12th November 1979) is a Pacitalian politician serving as the 75th and current Prime Minister of the Pacitalian Republic. He served as Prime Minister from nearly seven years, from January 2018 to December 2024, and was the leader of the centre-left Pacitalian Social Democratic Congress from June 2020 to December 2024. Prior to the PSDC's creation, he had served as the leader of one of its constituent parties, the Democratic Nationalist Party, from May 2016.
Thirty-eight years old at the time of his entry into office, Moya was the third-youngest Prime Minister in Pacitalian history; he was also only the second Prime Minister of Iberian descent and the first of partial Empordian descent. At the time of his election, Moya was also the first Prime Minister from a socialist political party.
Born in the Marquerían town of Castillo Palancar to a working-class family, Moya graduated from public school with high honours, and initially attended Archangel Beo University on scholarship, pursuing a dual bachelor of arts in international relations and economics. He subsequently transferred to the small liberal arts university Universidad Comprensiva Marqueriana de las Artes (UCMA) to complete his undergraduate degree, and, following a gap year abroad, earned a Juris Master law degree from the University of Mandragora.
Moya joined a major Macabean law firm immediately after graduation, initially working as an articling clerk. He was admitted to the bar association in Pungaria in 2006, permitting him to practice law. He opened his own practice in the Pungarian port city of Fiascano, where he did a significant amount of pro bono work for poor and underprivileged clientèle. Moya once again entered the spotlight when his firm sued the national and Pungarian governments to force them to stop dismantling homeless and migrant camps near the Port of Fiascano.
First elected as a Member of the Republican Parliament (MRP) for the then-DNP at the 2014 parliamentary elections in Pungaria's 15th district, he emerged as one of the party's higher-profile lawmakers. Moya served as the party's spokesperson on law and justice matters from 2014 to 2016. The party entered a lengthy leadership contest following leader Cristián Piñera's unexpected death in 2014. Moya, initially hesitant to enter the race, acceded to pressure from colleagues and announced a bid to become the DNP's leader. At the party's leadership convention in late April 2016, he was elected leader on the first ballot, defeating Sorinel Vulpes with 69 percent of the vote.
In the 2017 parliamentary elections, Moya led the DNP to the second-largest share of seats in the Constazione, Pacitalia's junior parliamentary body, while also winning a plurality of the seats in the Pacitalian senate for the first time in the party's history. After the centre-right FPD failed to form a new coalition government post-election, Moya was named formateur and subsequently formed a centre-left minority coalition with the Pacitalian Social Congress (PSC) that relied on the support of smaller progressive parties in the new parliament.
The DNP merged with the PSC in 2020 to become the Pacitalian Social Democratic Congress. Moya became leader of the merged party. Lauded for his government's effective leadership during the COVID-19 pandemic, the PSDC won majority control of both houses of parliament in the 2020 election, the first time since 2007 that a party was able to govern alone at the national level.
Following the loss of its majority in the lower house in 2023, and a defeat in the following year's regional elections, Moya resigned as party leader and prime minister.
Early life
Moya was born on 12th November 1979, to auto plant worker Alejandro Moya and nurse Teresa Cárbajal, the oldest of three children. He grew up in the small Marquerían mountain town of Castillo Palancar, which was about a 20-minute drive northwest of the Peruzzi manufacturing plant outside Monterio, where his father worked. The family had deep working-class and labour union roots, with both Alejandro and Teresa active in their respective unions. Teresa was the union representative for obstetrics and gynecology (ob-gyn) nurses at her local hospital and was awarded Distinguished Service Medals in 1987 and 1990 by the national nurses' union Sindicato Popolare Repubblicana dell'Infermieri. Alejandro served on the assembly line workers' shop council at the plant, where workers were represented by the powerful Fraternità degli Lavoratori Pacitaliana Industriale (Pacitalian Industrial Workers' Brotherhood).
Moya, in an interview with PBC News during the 2017 election campaign, credited his parents with instilling values of "fairness, acceptance and justice" from a young age, fending off criticisms from right-leaning FPD MRP Yusuf Osman that he had been "indoctrinated by his Marxist parents". He would respond by saying "my parents are not Marxist, and how I view the world is something I own. These values are mine and mine alone."
Moya attended public schools throughout his youth. He graduated with high honours and accepted a scholarship to attend the prestigious Archangel Beo University, a nominally Orthodox Christian school in Amita, entering post-secondary in the fall of 1997. He would later describe the experience as "overwhelming and intoxicating", enthralled by the "free exchange of ideas and opinions", citing encouragement from professors to speak his mind, which, he said, differed dramatically from the final years of secondary school, where teachers would admonish students "who spoke out of turn or challenged what they were being taught".
As Deputy President of the Archangel Beo University student union, Moya would rise to national attention for the first time. The Ell government's 1998 move to end student subsidies – which many students relied on to afford post-secondary education – and repeal a law regulating the costs of post-secondary tuition, caused a massive spike in tuition and boarding costs over the next three years. Average tuition per semester increased from Đ 530 (roughly $1,400 at 1998 exchange rates) to Đ 1,883 in the year following deregulation, rapidly moving Pacitalia from one of the most affordable developed countries in which to earn a degree to one of the least.
Moya and union president Giovanni Prato became the face of the protests when they began in March 1999, resulting in a 53-day strike by undergraduates at the university. During the strike, the university administration waged a public relations campaign against Moya, Prato, and striking students, placing them on academic probation and publicly threatening to expel them if they did not "cease their work to damage the reputation of the university". The response from university administrators would instead inspire similar walkouts at universities and colleges across the country, involving several schools and hundreds of thousands of students, and led to the national government ushering in a tuition freeze to try to quell the unrest.
After completing his second year, having grown increasingly disenchanted with the deeply conservative school and frustrated by the administration's response to the student strike, Moya transferred to the Universidad Comprensiva Marqueriana de las Artes (UCMA), a small liberal arts university in Rado de Finetera, Marquería, to complete his degree. He completed a gap year in Starblaydia and returned to Pacitalia to study law at the University of Mandragora, graduating with a Juris Master in 2004. Moya would later remark he "went out of his way" to avoid getting involved in student politics while in graduate school, after his experiences at Archangel Beo University.
Legal career
Moya was hired by international Macabean law firm Geroht + Williams almost immediately upon graduating from the University of Mandragora and sent to the firm's Fontevella office as an articling clerk. After completing a full year there, he began the process of earning admission to the Pacitalian bar. Despite the firm's initial eagerness to hire Moya, his relationship with the mega-firm would gradually sour, with the partners repeatedly questioning his political views. In the end, a request to transfer to the firm's office in Monterio to be closer to home was rejected, and the standing offer from the firm to promote Moya to associate lawyer upon admission to the bar was unexpectedly rescinded. Moya resigned from the firm around the time he was admitted to the bar and decided to open his own practice, taking out a business loan at Banco Bursatíl de Monterio y Roquereda (BBMR) to fund the venture.
Though he continued to lean toward returning home to Marquería to open his own practice, Moya would eventually decide to remain in Pungaria, moving to the working-class port city of Fiascano.
Fiascano migrant camp
Around this time, migrants began arriving at Pacitalian seaports in increasing numbers, seeking asylum. Roughly 160,000 migrants sought asylum in Pacitalia in the year 2001; by 2006, this number had already quadrupled, and the FPD government began to consider measures to limit the number of asylum seekers, among a general sentiment that asylum applications were starting to overshadow legal immigration and get out of control. Although embroiled in an international diplomatic crisis with several erstwhile allies – which was partly of his own making – then-Prime Minister Constantino Sorantanali, armed with a parliamentary majority, moved to introduce legislation to cap asylum applications at 200,000 per year for a decade, regardless of the means of their arrival. The government would immediately deport anyone else trying to enter the country illegally and/or by seeking asylum after the annual cap was reached.
Meanwhile, Sorantanali ordered the demolition of three large migrant camps on the western mainland coast, including the notorious L'Arruffa ("The Tangle") camp on vacant land next to the docks at the Port of Fiascano, claiming the camps were unsanitary and a public health hazard. To address harsh criticism from the opposition, the government promised to build temporary housing for migrants in the process of getting asylum applications approved. The Arruffa camp was by far the largest, home to an estimated 240,000 people in 2006. The camp was a mix of migrants who had arrived on freighters and other boats, and homeless people from the city and other parts of the country who had been drawn there by the milder year-round climate and the hope of finding work either at the docks or out at sea. Residents lived in caravans, tents, and more permanent, albeit hastily constructed, huts.
As soon as the national government announced its intent to demolish the camp, Moya filed a motion for an injunction to try to stop the dismantling of the camp, arguing the government had an obligation to build safe replacement housing before evicting the camp's residents, regardless of their immigration status. The government's response to the claim, while commencing the demolition, was to deny any "legal, ethical or moral responsibility" over "illegal and extra-legal migrants". Residents were ordered out of the camp and given 72 hours to leave, at which point bulldozers were brought in and workers armed with flamethrowers began to burn down property left behind. Fourteen of the residents of the camp, who had defied the order to leave, died in those fires, resulting in unwanted international scrutiny over the Pacitalian government's handling of the matter. An inquiry was later launched into the government's "negligence" to ensure all residents had left the camp safely before commencing the demolition efforts.
The judge hearing the case then ruled in Moya's favour, moved by the "utterly avoidable" deaths of the camp's residents, and ordered the demolition to a halt. Sorantanali resigned, beset by multiple scandals, less than a month later, and his successor, Albinanda Serodini, abandoned any further efforts to dismantle migrant camps. The Arruffa camp is still standing as of 2018 and home to roughly the same number of permanent residents as there were in 2006.
Incidentally, it is Moya's government that, after a decade of neglect of the camp or opposition to it by successive national governments, has announced a long-term plan to deal with the camps. Moya and his interior minister Sorinel Vulpes revealed in the summer of 2018 that Timiocato's multi-billion doura plan to build new public housing would include permanent homes, retroactive citizenship and amnesty for all migrants.
Member of the Republican Parliament (2014– )
Moya was first elected to the Constazione at the 2014 parliamentary elections. He was recruited by then-DNP leader Cristián Piñera to stand as a candidate in Pungaria's fifteenth district, which incorporates the southern half of the city of Fiascano – including the ports where Moya had first gained national profile as a lawyer – and parts of the Giretania beaches. Though working-class, and therefore favourable to a left-wing, labour-driven party like the DNP, the seat was historically a stronghold of the more moderate, centre-left Pacitalian Social Congress. First-time candidates do not often stand in district seat races, where instant-runoff voting is employed to determine a winner; they usually run on the party list to increase their chances of getting elected. The decision to stand in a district, regardless of Moya's profile, was considered risky.
| Pungaria 15th district parliamentary election, 2014 | ||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Candidate and party | First ballot | Second ballot | Third ballot | Fourth ballot | ||||||
| DNP | Damián Moya | DNP | 303,730 | 25.2% | 323,251 | 27.1% | 343,424 | 29.7% | 571,921 | 51.6% |
| FPD | Paolmarco Fini | FPD | 353,587 | 29.3% | 387,912 | 32.5% | 477,015 | 41.2% | 536,777 | 48.4% |
| PSC | Geronimo Sacuzzo (i) | PSC | 261,820 | 21.7% | 294,393 | 24.6% | 336,536 | 29.1% | ||
| CD | Alessandra Di Facco | XDem | 183,470 | 15.2% | 189,101 | 15.8% | ||||
| PGP | Danica Scoparata | Green | 104,763 | 8.7% | ||||||
| No second preference ("spun") votes | 12,713 | 37,682 | 48,277 | |||||||
| Valid votes | 1,207,370 (94.7% of electorate) | |||||||||
| Majority | 554,350 (50%+1 of valid final-ballot votes) | |||||||||
Indeed, Moya narrowly escaped defeat on the third ballot, where he saw off incumbent MRP Geronimo Sacuzzo of the PSC. The margin between Moya and Sacuzzo after three rounds of counting was less than 7,000 votes out of 1.15 million. He then faced the FPD's Paolmarco Fini, who led the first three ballots, in the fourth and final tally, and, by taking over two-thirds of Sacuzzo's second-preference votes, leapfrogged Fini to earn a majority of votes and win the seat.
The victory was considered a major coup for the DNP, who replicated their success at the expense of the PSC and Greens in several other historically red seats across the country in the 2014 election. Ultimately, the DNP, which had led opinion polls for almost the entire campaign, fell to defeat nationally at the hands of the FPD, with leader and incumbent Prime Minister Archetenia Nera leading a last-minute shift among voters back to the centre-right party to earn another term in power. The DNP became the main opposition party.
Piñera, who reportedly had leaned toward appointing Moya as justice minister in a DNP government, appointed Moya the party's spokesperson (or critic) on law and justice matters, elevating him to a senior position in the shadow cabinet. Piñera remarked both privately and publicly that he had "a lot of faith" in the young lawyer and felt comfortable entrusting a major file to a rookie MRP, "given his talents".
In his first term in Parliament, Moya spoke in favour of eliminating hurdles to obtaining government-issued identity documents based on proof-of-habitation requirements, advocating instead for a "reference-based" system that allowed another member of the community to vouch for someone's identity to obtain a passport or driver's licence.
He introduced several opposition motions, most prominent among them:
- calling for an end to racial profiling by law enforcement in indigenous communities (2014M312);
- upholding the right of workers injured on the job to collect disability pension at guaranteed rates and access rehabilitation services (2014M351);
- reaffirming authorities' ability to seize the proceeds of crime and the assets of convicted criminals, a policy known as "civil forfeiture" (2015M15); and,
- denying employers the right to refuse to hire someone if they declined to provide tax or identity information during the hiring process (2015M163).
As justice spokesperson, Moya co-sponsored a multi-party bill reinforcing Pacitalia's commitment to net neutrality, which ultimately passed the Constazione 530–167. Moya introduced a bill regarding civil forfeiture, a supplement to his 2015 motion. Moya said the bill aimed "to set a higher bar to clear" to justify the seizure of assets and proceeds related to criminal activity. It was defeated 347–303.
Party leadership (2016– )
Just a few months after the 2014 election concluded, DNP leader Cristián Piñera died suddenly from a heart attack, plunging the party into months of uncertainty and an unanticipated leadership contest. Longtime former leader Jávier Grandinetti, who remained an MRP after Piñera succeeded him in 2010, returned to serve as party chief in the interim.
| Pungaria 15th district parliamentary election, 2017 | ||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Candidate and party | First ballot | Second ballot | Third ballot | Fourth ballot | ||||||
| DNP | Damián Moya (i) | DNP | 491,703 | 39.0% | 495,266 | 39.5% | 564,376 | 45.4% | 657,645 | 54.4% |
| FPD | Fidelio Pappo | FPD | 378,933 | 30.0% | 439,065 | 35.0% | 456,027 | 36.6% | 552,220 | 45.6% |
| PGP | Danica Scoparata | Green | 168,174 | 13.3% | 191,756 | 15.3% | 224,043 | 18.0% | ||
| PSC | Geronimo Sacuzzo | PSC | 125,682 | 10.0% | 128,872 | 10.3% | ||||
| CD | Stavros Nikolidis | XDem | 97,888 | 7.8% | ||||||
| No second preference ("spun") votes | 7,421 | 10,513 | 34,581 | |||||||
| Valid votes | 1,262,380 (96.3% of electorate) | |||||||||
| Majority | 604,933 (50%+1 of valid final-ballot votes) | |||||||||
Piñera's death led the media to immediately speculate as to who might be his successor. Moya's name surfaced several times as a potential candidate, though he repeatedly denied rumours he was considering a run. In April 2015, he tried to be unequivocal about not running by sitting down for an interview with PBC News. "A lot of people have been guessing that I am taking the temperature of the assembly to see what they might think about me as the leader," Moya said. "It's flattering... but I am here to state very clearly I am happy in my current role as the justice spokesperson. I am proud of the work we have been doing holding the government to account on legal matters. I don't intend to seek the leadership and I think there are lots of well-qualified people in the party who should make a run. I'm looking forward to supporting who I feel is the best choice among those people."
Despite the strong statement and his refusal to enter the race, various media outlets continued to name Moya as a likely candidate throughout 2015. Moya continued to deny any interest in running, later adding he didn't feel it was appropriate for a first-term MRP to be the leader. The party, meanwhile, hoping to keep itself on track after the unexpected death of their leader, relied on Grandinetti's experience to carry them through 2015 and delayed a vote on Piñera's replacement until May 2016. By late 2015, a "Draft Moya" campaign had begun among party members that eventually swelled to over 45,000 members on social media; this marked the point that Moya reportedly began to reconsider whether or not to stand as a candidate.
After receiving an encouraging phone call from Vittoria Agradossa, the general secretary of the Sindicato Popolare Repubblicana dell'Infermieri (SPRI) – Pacitalia's largest nurses' union and one of the most politically influential labour movements in the country – Moya agreed to run. (Agradossa would go on to be named the DNP's candidate for archonate in the 2017 election, winning over the FPD's Archetenia Nera in the runoff. She would name Moya the formateur after the 2017 election, allowing him to eventually become Prime Minister.)
Moya initially formed a leadership committee the second week of January 2016, led by fellow DNP MRPs Dr. Ferdinando Roncero and Sebastiano Zolà. The committee estimated that over half the parliamentary assembly would favour him as the leader and that a general membership vote would also fall in his favour "either on the second or third ballot". He formally declared his candidacy for leadership of the DNP on 26th January 2016, facing off against longtime DNP stalwart and former cabinet member Sorinel Vulpes, Monterio mayor Pablo Robredo Zimmermann, and the regional president of Pomentane, Carla Calasanti. The race earned significant media attention as all four candidates were under the age of 50, telegenic and charismatic, and arguably experienced in their professional fields before entering politics (or as a politician in the case of Vulpes).
By the time the leadership vote was held at the end of April 2016, only Moya and Vulpes remained in the race – Robredo Zimmermann and Calasanti both dropped out citing a lack of support and endorsed Moya upon their exit. Moya went on to defeat Vulpes, 69 percent to 31, on the first and only ballot, and was officially installed as the DNP's new leader on 1st May 2016.
Prime Minister (2018– )
First term (2018-2020)
- Main article: Moya I government
COVID-19 pandemic (2020-2022)
- Main article: COVID-19 pandemic in Pacitalia
Second term (2020-2023)
- Main article: Moya II government, Moya III government
Third term (2023-present)
- Main article: Moya IV government
Personal life
Moya is unmarried and has kept a close lid on his personal life. In 2019, he started dating fellow lawyer Domenica Bracca. The two are now legally a domestic partnership under Pacitalian law, as they have lived together for more than two years. Moya and Bracca have repeatedly fended off media questions about their relationship status and desires to get married or have children, stating in 2020 they were "happy" with things as they are.