Romania’s pro-EU parties have pledged to form a governing coalition. Also, in an attempt to prevent a resurgence of the far right, they may present a single candidate for the country’s canceled presidential elections when they are held again next year. The Social Democratic Party (PSD), their current coalition partners, the center-right National Liberal Party (PNL), the center-right opposition Save Romania Union (USR) and the ethnic Hungarian party UDMR said they intended to move quickly, The Guardian reports.
“In the coming days, the four parties and the representatives of the national minorities will work on a common governing program based on development and reforms that will take into account the priorities of the Romanian citizens,” they declared late Tuesday.
The PSD won the largest number of seats in the general election on December 1, but three ultra-nationalist, hard-right and anti-establishment parties, some with open pro-Russian sympathies, collected more than a third of the vote. together. The far-right parliamentary advance came a week after Calin Georgescu, a little-known ultranationalist independent candidate, shocked the country by coming from almost nowhere to finish first in the first round of presidential voting.
Georgescut’s success, following a campaign based largely on viral TikTok videos artificially boosted by bots, fueled accusations of foreign interference and fears that Romania would turn to the far right.
On Friday, two days before the scheduled runoff, the constitutional court annulled the first round, ruling that it was “damaged by numerous irregularities and violations of electoral legislation” and saying the entire process would have to be repeated. Setting the dates for the first and second rounds will be one of the first tasks of the new administration. Meanwhile, the outgoing president, Klaus Iohannis, will appoint a new prime minister and remain in office until the new head of state is sworn in.
