The Romanians are about to elect the president in the cliffhanger election on Sunday. The cliffhanger election has fixed and polarized the country as both candidates run neck and neck in the latest poll.
Most Romanians consider today’s choice to be perhaps the most important vote in Romania’s post-communist history. The first time of the vote showed significant turnout in both the country and the diaspora. This is a sign of a major stake in the future direction of NATO’s eastern side, Euroneuz Romania reports.
Voting in the diaspora has doubled compared to the first round, but in Romania, urban voters and young people have already surpassed their first round participation.
As participation in the vote is a critical electoral factor, a historic million votes were cast at 12pm in the diaspora, including the Republic of Moldova.
Centristic independent candidate Nicoa Dan voted along with his wife in his quiet Fagalas home town in Transylvania. He represents the current Pro-EU, Pronat Course, and said he voted “for cooperation with European partners, not Romania’s isolation.”
Hardlight nationalist candidate George Simion voted outside Bucharest for the choice of future prime minister Karin Georgek, the protagonist of the unprecedented abolition election in December and the political crisis that followed.
At Friday’s talk show, Simion and Georgeuk sorted their campaigns and outlined their potential doctrines first. The political couple said they prioritize good relations with the United States, as Georgek calls Simion “George” and “my protégé,” and Simion calls him “Mr. Georgek who I learned a lot.”
“We do everything with them, but there are China, Russia and Brazil too,” Georgek said.
“It’s hard to imagine that we don’t have a substantial, non-nonsense relationship of minimal respect. We’ve caught up in terms of EU fund absorption. So far, we haven’t raised EU money due to incompetence at the state level.”
Simion said, “We will not withdraw from the Alliance and will work together as we say this is a foreign policy with all the states of the world.” Taking into account the concerns of the EU as a whole, Simion declared, “We will not withdraw from the Alliance.”
After voting on Sunday morning outside Bucharest, surrounded by multiple bodyguards and supporters, Simion said he opposed “the inequality and humiliation that our sisters and brothers submit to us here, our present boundaries, everywhere.”
“I voted against abuse, I voted against poverty, I voted against those who ignored us all. But I voted for the future too,” Simion added.
Simion and Georgek were asked by police to leave the polling station as the law was trying to deal with the media next to the voting booth, as they were internally banning campaigns. A social media video shows Simion saying, “Thank you, Officer Mr. doesn’t want us to take the media out of it.”
Georgek, known as the “Tictok Messiah,” came to the top in the first round of the Romanian presidential election in December 2024. The constitutional court was invalidated following the declassification of the intelligence report showing Russia’s involvement influencing voters through social media to support the ignorant and unknown candidates of the time.
Georgeuk continues to face criminal cases, including committing anti-agency actions and misreporting his campaign finances.
The accusation revolves around his support for the Iron Guard sympathizers, a pre-WWII fascists and anti-Semitist movements and political parties that are illegal under Romanian law.
“We’re at the intersection.”
After the vote, former Romanian president, NATO Ally Traian Basescu, did not speak in uncertain terms.
“This is an important vote, and we are at the intersection and have a clear choice to the west or east,” Baisk said.
“If the choice is pro-Moscow, they vote for one candidate, and if the choice is pro-Atlantic, they vote for another candidate. That’s it. That’s the decisive day.”
The Romanian diaspora, an estimated 6 million people whose votes can decide on elections, has been voting since Friday, already surpassing the first round of vote turnout, as a sign of a massive mobilization for the country’s choice and future.
On Saturday, the Euroneus spoke with Romanian voters in Belgium. There, more than 29 polling stations were established across the country.
“There is a possibility that the pro-European future, access to European funding, cooperation with member states, free movement within the European region, and more recently, Schengen, the freedom movement, could move freely,” said one voter asked about the choice.
In contrast, another said, “We voted for what the candidates inspired us. It’s something we’ve never seen before. We didn’t vote for less evil.
Voting can proceed either way, so their outcome on the deep division of Romanian society and the immediate political and economic evolution of the country is a major challenge for those who win tonight’s election.
Meanwhile, Simion has already expressed concerns about alleged fraud by voters, and in the case of his loss on Sunday, his supporters are ready to protest, and several online posts calling for Bucharest’s Ukrainian-style “Maidan” – threats that added even more fuel to the country’s growing tensions.
Follow Euronows Romania’s live coverage of repeat leaks of presidential elections here.
