Save Bucharest Union (USB) has requested Tuesday morning the vote recount in District 1 Bucharest, invoking statistical discrepancy in the number of votes obtained by the USB candidate, Clotilde Armand.
District 1 Electoral Office sources said that the USB request was received Tuesday morning, around 9.20h, by e-mail.
USB leader Nicușor Dan said his party was left without representatives in some polling stations, as some delegates left to the Maroon 5 concert downtown Bucharest, tvr.ro informs. He added USB has had initially delegates to all polling stations in District 1, but not all of them were party members, but people who have volunteered to help. Some of them left the polling stations early to go to Maroon 5 concert on Sunday evening. “We couldn’t replace them, as a deadline existed for their volunteering, some polling stations were left without USB representatives,” Nicusor Dan said.
USB candidate Clotilde Armand won 28.7% of the votes, according to provisional BEC results on Monday, surpassed by the PSD candidate Daniel Tudorache, who was voted by 31.1% of the voters.
Exit polls and early official data from BEC on Sunday evening, revealed Clotilde Armand as winner in District 1.
According to first BEC provisional results in District 1, Clotilde Armand (USB) had 32.3%, followed by Dan Tudorache (PSD) – 31.9%, Alexandru Nazare (PNL) – 16.6% and Eugen Tomac (PMP) 7.2%.
PSD’s Firea: A defeat must be accepted with fair play
Social-democrat Gabriela Firea, winner of the mayor seat in Bucharest, said on Tuesday about the USB request for a vote recount in District 1, that a defeat that should be accepted with fair play and that all parties have signed the protocols, adding that USB has violated the election law on the day of voting.
“I believe that it’s not fair to bring such information and it is not a good start in politics,” she said. Firea also said that all parties have signed the protocols and, had irregularities been registered in the voting process, most likely PNL or the other parties would have disputed the election in District 1. “I do not believe we can be suspected of connections with these parties,” she said.
In this context, she claimed she has proof that actually the USB is the only party that has violated the electoral law on the day of voting, with online messages.