World News – CA – Romania’s Social Democrats take the lead in major parliamentary elections with low turnout

BUCHAREST – Romania’s opposition Social Democrats (PSD) have taken the lead in the country’s parliamentary elections according to preliminary results wave of voter dissatisfaction over the mixed results of the ruling liberals in their handling of the coronavirus pandemic.

With 99 percent of the vote in the elections on Jan.. December were counted, the PSD had 29. 8 percent of the vote in the Chamber of Deputies and 30 percent. 2 percent in the Senate. The pro-European National Liberal Party (PNL) had 25. 1 percent in the Chamber of Deputies and 25. 5 percent in the Senate, said the Central Electoral Bureau.

However, there are not around 265 in the count. 000 votes from the Romanian diaspora included. Romanians living in Western Europe have traditionally voted against the PSD, which they see as corrupt and in many cases a reason for leaving the country.

Even if the PSD wins the election, the party will lack allies in the new parliament. President Klaus Iohannis, a former PNL leader, said he would not allow the party to return to government during its current term, which ends in 2024.

The center-right alliance Save Romania Union-Liberty, Unity and Solidarity Party (USR-PLUS) took third place with 14. 5 percent in the Chamber of Deputies and 15 percent in the Senate showed the almost complete returns.

The far-right Alliance for the Romanian Union, a party founded last year by a pro-Bessarabian activist and promoter of the idea of ​​a single Romanian state including Moldova, will enter parliament for the first time. It received 8. 7 percent in the Chamber of Deputies and 8 percent. 8 percent in the Senate after the results.

After a poll on the exit predicted an unexpectedly strong performance by the PSD, new party leader Marcel Ciolacu said he expected Orban’s resignation.

« The PNL believes it is the winner of this election, » Prime Minister Ludovic Orban told supporters. « We will try to represent a wide range of interests. « 

The elections in the Member State of the European Union were seen as key to deciding whether the Liberals would receive enough support to tackle their much-needed reformist agenda.

The vote took place just over a year after the PNL minority government took office following the collapse of the PSD cabinet following a series of corruption scandals and massive public protests.

The Liberals, led by Orban and Iohannis, had tried to allay concerns about the pandemic in order to urge voters to come out in large numbers.
However, Romanians were suspicious of the pandemic and disaffected with Romania’s political class. The turnout was only around 32 percent, which is below the 2016 parliamentary elections.
Romania, one of the poorest members of the European Union, initially treated the coronavirus pandemic with unexpected success, despite an acute shortage of modern facilities, an exodus of medical staff and endemic corruption in the health system.
A fresh surge in infections after the summer, however, wasn’t associated with the same determination. And the health network, which was still affected by the first wave, was quickly overwhelmed.

Despite corruption and poverty, Romania remains resolutely pro-EU and pro-American, with Orban and Iohannis pledging to launch a modernization campaign long delayed in the three decades since the fall of communism, and the country pro-western to keep path.
The landslide victory of the PSD, heir to the Communist Party and the political force that has largely dominated Romanian politics for the past 30 years, allowed it to unleash a sweeping attack on the judiciary and the rule of law in 2016 that put tens of thousands of Romanians on the streets and sparked strong warnings from the EU and the United States.
Although the PSD was weakened last year by its incarceration on corruption charges of its former leader Liviu Dragnea and removed from power by a vote of no confidence last year, it has the largest network of party organizations.

The PSD also dominates most of the local administration in rural areas, where it relies on a group of influential « local barons » whose leftist credentials remain questionable but whose power is indispensable to the PSD.
Ciolacu, who has carefully distanced himself from Dragnea, has accused Orban’s government of « incompetence » and failed to keep the spread of the coronavirus under control.

After a decade-long shutdown, the Romanian service of RFE / RL was restarted on digital platforms in 2019 to combat the diminishing independence of the media in Romania and the spread of disinformation.

Romania, 2020 Romanian Parliamentary Elections, National Liberal Party, Ludovic Orban