Romanians began to vote, Sunday, December 6, for legislative elections in which the pro-European liberals in power are given favorites, despite a criticized management of the Covid-19 pandemic which threatens to overwhelm the end-of-year celebrations.

More than 18 million voters are expected at the polls which will close at 9 p.m. (local time), an electoral process subject to the restrictive measures that have become the norm (masks, disinfectants, distancing).

Abroad, where the polling stations opened on Saturday, nearly 90,000 people had already cast their vote, according to the electoral authority (AEP).

Driven by poverty, 4 million Romanians have emigrated in recent years, particularly to Western Europe, in search of better paid jobs.

The abstention rate could reach 60%

In Romania, however, there shouldn't be crowds.

The result of the combined effect of the pandemic and voter fatigue, the abstention rate could be around 60%, according to analysts.

The race promises to be a contested one, but Prime Minister Ludovic Orban, at the head of a center-right minority government for a year, seems well positioned to keep his post. 

His Liberal Party (PNL) is credited with 28% of the voting intentions in this ballot in a single round, ahead of the Social Democrats (PSD, opposition, 23%) and the reformists of a young center-right alliance, USR -More (18%), according to a latest survey from the IMAS institute.

Support of the popular Romanian president

In a region where populists and sovereignists are gaining ground, Ludovic Orban shows his attachment to European values ​​and promises to modernize health and education systems with aging infrastructures, strained by the pandemic.

The Liberals have a major advantage: the support of the popular head of state Klaus Iohannis, from their ranks.

Dismissing accusations of "breaking the Constitution", the latter openly campaigned for the PNL and ruled out a return to social democratic affairs during his second term, which runs until 2024.

Friday, on the last day of the campaign, he launched a new spike at the address of the PSD, hoping that "Romania will definitively separate from those who have tried to derail it from its European and democratic course".

Big winner of the previous election in 2016, the PSD had launched a controversial overhaul of the judicial system that had aroused severe warnings from Brussels.

This reform was also greeted by a wave of protest on an unprecedented scale since the fall of the communist regime at the end of 1989.

Weakened further by the imprisonment for corruption of its former leader Liviu Dragnea, the PSD, which has dominated the political scene for the past 30 years, was removed from power by a motion of censure at the end of 2019 but remains in the majority in Parliament .

Calling on Romanians to vote in numbers, Ludovic Orban pledged to stay the course of the reforms expected by the EU, of which Romania has been a member since 2007, and to rebound the economy, hard hit by the pandemic.

The new boss of the PSD, Marcel Ciolacu, on the other hand accuses the government of "incompetence", blaming it for the "failure" to keep the second wave of Covid-19 under control.

With AFP

The summary of the week

France 24 invites you to come back to the news that marked the week

I subscribe

Take international news everywhere with you!

Download the France 24 application

google-play-badge_FR