The Romanians begin an electoral marathon this weekend which will last three weeks. The first round of the presidential election this Sunday will be followed in a week by the single round of the legislative elections. Finally, on Sunday December 8, at the end of the second round of the presidential election, they will know who will succeed President Klaus Iohannis, who has been in power for ten years. Who are the main candidates for the presidency of Romania and what project did they campaign with?
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Fourteen candidates – 11 men and 3 women – are seeking the presidency of the Romania for the next five years in a direct two-round election. According to the latest polls, only 3 or 4 candidates can really claim a place in the final on December 8.
The best placed is Marcel Ciolacu, 56 years old. Acting President of the Social Democratic Party (PSD), he has held the position of Prime Minister since June 2023 at the head of a coalition government with the National Liberal Party (PNL).
Then, the nationalist leader George Simion, 38 years old, deputy and leader of the Alliance for the Union of Romanians (AUR), is credited by most polls with a second place on Sunday November 24, synonymous with a qualification in final.
In third position, but in a close tie with Simion – in any case, within the pollsters’ margin of error – would arrive Elena Lasconi, candidate of the Union Save Romania (USR) party, a heterogeneous movement which brings together as many neoliberals and Christian Democrats than social democrats and ecologists. At 52, this former star presenter of ProTV television has been mayor of a medium-sized provincial town, Câmpulung Muscel, for four years.
Finally, the latest polls put the independent Mircea Geoană in fourth position, neck and neck with the liberal Nicolae Ciucă. The first, at 66 years old – the oldest of all – was president of the PSD and unsuccessful candidate for the presidency of Romania in 2009, a position which escaped him by a few tens of thousands of votes. After leaving his party, he also left Romania in 2019 to settle in Brussels where he held, until September this year, the position of deputy secretary general of theNATO. Finally, retired general Nicolae Ciucă, 57, president of the PNL and the Romanian Senate, former Prime Minister and Minister of Defense, distinguished himself above all as a soldier on the Afghan and Iraqi fronts in the early 2000s. Doctor in military sciences, he was nevertheless challenged in 2022 by an investigative journalist according to whom a third of the text of his thesis was plagiarism.
Among the other contenders for the Romanian presidency, we find, as in every election of this type, the representative of the Hungarian minority (6% of the population), a lawyer, a former Minister of Foreign Affairs, two former veterinarians, a former pope and a former officer of the foreign intelligence services. Finally, the conservative Ludovic Orban, 61, former Prime Minister, withdrew from the race a few days ago and joined Elena Lasconi. Ballots in his name, already printed and distributed, which are found in the ballot boxes will be considered invalid.
A dull and uninteresting electoral campaign
The electoral campaign was dismal and demonstrated, according to most commentators, the very low level of skills of the candidates. The first and only debate between several contenders, with the exception of the two members of the government coalition, namely Ciolacu and Ciucă, focused on very general subjects and of little interest to most voters. Thus, education, health or the fight against corruption were avoided.
On the themes of a president’s “reserved domain” – namely security and foreign policy – the incompetence of certain candidates was glaring. Thus, Elena Lasconi does not know very well how NATO works (notably its famous article 5), who are the members of the Security Council ofUN and what is Romania’s position on Middle East. But she readily compares herself to Ronald Reaganone of the most conservative American presidents, even though his party wants to be rather progressive. George Simion is, for his part, a fervent supporter of union with the Republic of Moldovawhile he is prohibited from entering this border country and historically very close to Romania. Likewise, the nationalist tribune is opposed to any aid toUkraine – another country that has closed its doors to it – and often aligns itself with Moscow’s position and discourse in the conflict with kyiv. Anti-European, Orthodox activist and open opponent of the LGBT community, but also of migrants and any other minority, George Simion was also recently accused of being a spy in the pay of the Russians. Evidence for this is lacking, at least for now. Some speculate that in the event of qualification for the second round, this “evidence” could appear, which could help Marcel Ciolacu, his likely opponent, to win the vote. Finally, very strangely, Mircea Geoană, although with diplomatic experience in the upper echelons of NATO, recently estimated that Ukraine had to accept losing territories in the event of a peace agreement with the Russiaa hypothesis categorically refused by all Westerners.
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In the past, the diaspora vote has played an important, sometimes crucial, role. Thus, in 2009, the president Traian Basescu was elected in the second round at the expense of Mircea Geoană thanks to the votes of Romanians abroad. Likewise, in 2014, the Romanian diaspora largely contributed to the victory of Klaus Iohannis against PSD representative Victor Ponta. Five years later, it was again Romanians abroad who sanctioned the social democrats in the European elections.
Today, however, most analysts believe that the diaspora has lost its illusions and has abandoned modernist and pro-European ideas to be lulled by populist and radical discourses. Already this summer, during the European elections, George Simion’s party had occupied first place in five of the most important countries of the Romanian diaspora, namely Spain, Belgium, France, Austria and the United States. . A massive anti-system vote is therefore less and less to be ruled out this weekend. The closer the vote inside Romania, the more votes from outside will weigh in the final result.
► The RFI Romania website