Romania election stunner: Unexpected hard-right candidate surges in presidential vote

 

Romania election stunner: Unexpected hard-right candidate surges in presidential vote

 

Ultranationalist Călin Georgescu comes from nowhere to lead center-left PM Marcel Ciolacu and liberal Elena Lasconi in first round.

 

Călin Georgescu, extremely religious and nationalistic, campaigned on reducing Romania’s reliance on imports, supporting farmers, and increasing domestic production of food and energy.

 

November 24, 2024 10:59 pm CET

By Victor Jack and Carmen Paun

https://www.politico.eu/article/romania-election-stunner-who-is-calin-georgescu-marcel-ciolacu/

 

Romanian ultranationalist Călin Georgescu is currently on track to make it to the final round of presidential elections, according to Sunday’s provisional results with more than 99 percent of precincts reporting.

 

According to the partial results, Georgescu leads with 22.91 percent followed by center-left Prime Minister Marcel Ciolacu on 19.8 percent. Reformist candidate Elena Lasconi is on 19.15 percent, while another hard-right candidate, George Simion, trails with 13.87 percent support.

 

An early exit poll had suggested that Lasconi was set to qualify for the presidential runoff but Georgescu surged as vote counting continued Sunday night, heralding a result that is set to upend Romanian politics. Preliminary results are subject to change as votes continue to come in.

“The 35-years-long economic uncertainty imposed on the Romanian people became uncertainty for the political parties today,” Georgescu said in his first reaction after polls closed. He called the result “an amazing awakening” of the Romanian people.

 

Georgescu, extremely religious and nationalistic, campaigned on reducing Romania’s reliance on imports, supporting farmers and increasing the domestic production of food and energy.

 

He has also argued that the EU and NATO do not properly represent Romanian interests and claimed Russia’s war in Ukraine, a Romanian neighbor, is manipulated by American military companies.

 

In 2022, he claimed that the U.S. anti-missile shield located in the southern Romanian village of Deveselu is part of a confrontation policy and not a peaceful measure. Russian President Vladimir Putin has argued the same.

 

He said at the time that he had no support from Russia but felt close to its culture. He described Putin as “a man who loves his country.”

 

Georgescu also said he admired Hungary because it knows how to negotiate internationally.

 

Georgescu is a university professor and international consultant on sustainable development, who worked for different United Nations organizations for more than a dozen years.

 

He leveraged TikTok to rally voters around him. “He managed to convince them by a combination of messianic speech, delivered in an elegant way, so as to capitalize on people’s frustrations,” said political analyst Radu Magdin.

 

Georgescu has drawn fierce criticism for his previous comments supporting Romania’s 20th-century fascist Legionary Movement, but rejected accusations that he is antisemitic.

 

Over the past decade, Georgescu was rumored several times as a potential prime minister for different parties, including Simion’s AUR.

 

Turnout across the country and among the Romanian diaspora was 52.5 percent, slightly above the 51.2 percent who voted in the previous presidential election in 2019.

 

The second round is set for Dec. 8 following Romania’s parliamentary election next Sunday.

 

Lasconi, the leader of the Save Romania Union, called on Romanians living in Canada and the United States, where polling stations were still open, to vote. “The fate of Romania depends on you,” she told them in a video posted on Facebook, adding that Romania’s pro-Western outlook was also up to them.

 

This story is being updated.