The Save Romania Union (USR) urges voters to boycott the referendum on redefining the family.
The leader of the USR Senators and vice-chairman of the party, Vlad Alexandrescu (photo), has urged the citizens to boycott the referendum, saying that the future popular consultation does not have anything to do with the idea of family.
“As vice-chairman of the formation and USR Senator, I urge all those who now listen to me to boycott this referendum, because unless the turnout reaches 30%, the referendum will not be validated and will have no consequences,” Vlad Alexandrescu has told RFI Romania.
The USR Senator says the organizers of the referendum are not interested in the Romanian families, because if that were the case, poor families would have been helped.
The Constitutional Court of Romania (CCR) has green-lighted on Monday the citizens’ initiative to amend the Constitution, after the Senate passed the initiative last week. The initiative that says family is based on the marriage between a man and a woman, not as currently stipulated, consented between spouses.
The constitutional judges have decided by 7 votes to 2 that the draft law to amend the Constitution related to a redefinition of the marriage is compliant with the constitutional provisions.
The CCR decision comes after Social Democrat leader Liviu Dragnea said he hails the Parliament’s move to pass the citizens’ initiative, and that the referendum redefining family will take place on October 7.
Several NGOs asked Dancila Cabinet and the Parliament Speakers, Calin Popescu Tariceanu and Liviu Dragnea, for urgent actions to hold a correct referendum on October 7, arguing the current law 3/2000 on the organization of a referendum has “serious shortages”.
Last week, several foreign rights groups, including Amnesty International, made a legal submission last week on the constitutionality of the October 7 vote, arguing a planned referendum to change the definition of family in Romania’s Constitution could lead to a breach of international human rights standards and increase homophobic discrimination in the country. Among the groups, there were ECSOL (European Commission on Sexual Orientation Law) and ILGA-EUROPE (European Region of the International Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Trans and Intersex Association).