CCR: Presidential election schedule remains the same

Yesterday, the Constitutional Court rejected the appeal filed by MEP Cristian Terheş regarding the results recorded in the first round of the presidential elections and validated the results recorded on November 24, when 9.4 million citizens decided that the second round would pit independent Călin Georgescu against USR candidate Elena Lasconi.

The CCR decision was announced by the president of the public institution, Marian Enache, who said: "The constitutional judges unanimously decided to reject as unfounded the appeal filed by candidate Cristian Terheş. The CCR unanimously decided: to confirm and validate the results of the elections for the position of President of Romania in the first round; to organize the second round on Sunday, December 8, in which Călin Georgescu and Elena Lasconi will participate. From the analysis of the appellant's notification, the Court held that the votes from the Diaspora were not contested and, as such, under the given conditions, their recount is no longer required. Even if some differences in votes were found during the recount of votes cast at polling stations in the country, to the extent that they do not result in fraud, they are considered only possible material errors".

The CCR's clarification regarding the votes from the Diaspora came in the conditions in which the Central Electoral Bureau sent to the Court a report drawn up after the recount of votes in the country and from 161 polling stations in the Diaspora out of the 950 opened abroad, a report which found that in the country Marcel Ciolacu has 1,750,031 votes, and Elena Lasconi has 1,623,482 votes, with the mention that the USR president obtained 4,000 more votes in the country following the recount. We note that, after the first round of voting, at the initial count, in the country, Ciolacu was still in second place, and after the centralization of the votes from the diaspora, he would reach third place. According to the BEC minutes after the recount of the votes from the country, 643,000 votes from the Diaspora still had to be recounted. After the first round of the presidential elections, according to the initial count of the votes cast in the Diaspora, Marcel Ciolacu had 22,996 votes, and Elena Lasconi had 216,161 votes.

In other words, even after the recount of the votes from the Diaspora, Elena Lasconi would have remained in second place in the November 24 election.

Following the CCR decision, the second round of the presidential elections is set to be a very tough one, given that 55% of the votes from the Diaspora in the parliamentary elections on Sunday, December 1, went to AUR, SOS and POT, political parties that declared their support for Călin Georgescu for the position of president of the country.

• PSD does not support any candidate in the second round of the presidential elections

Moreover, given that Georgescu received more votes in the first round of the presidential elections than each of the parties that entered Parliament, the second round of the presidential elections is set to be a difficult one for the second-place candidate, Elena Lasconi - the president of the USR, especially since not all PSD voters seem willing to continue on the pro-European path.

The signal in this regard was given on the evening of the parliamentary elections, at the closing of the polls, by the Social Democratic Prime Minister Marcel Ciolacu himself, who stated: "I believe that we must look carefully at today's result. It is an important signal sent to the political class: basically, let's develop the country with European money, but let's protect our identity, national values and faith".

The last part of Ciolacu's statement seems to be in line with the demands of the sovereignist parties, which practically sends a signal to the PSD electorate who would not like to see Elena Lasconi as president of Romania. Marcel Ciolacu's statement was reinforced yesterday by the decision taken by the PSD leaders indicating that the political party does not support either of the two candidates in the second round of the presidential elections. Immediately after yesterday's meeting of the PSD leaders, Marcel Ciolacu said: "PNL and PSD asked Romanians to vote for Ciucă and Ciolacu, which did not happen. This tells us what is happening in society and therefore, I will not take any steps to indicate one or the other of the candidates. Romanians know better what they have to do than what Marcel Ciolacu is sending them. Romanians must decide for themselves what is best for them".

In return, Ilie Bolojan, the leader of the PNL, reiterated that the liberals will unconditionally support Elena Lasconi in the second round of the presidential elections, as will the UDMR, according to Kelemen Hunor, who declared yesterday, after the CCR decision, that his party supports the USR candidate.