Presidential Election’s First Round May Be Reheld on December 15

The President of the Permanent Electoral Authority, Toni Greblă, explained, in an intervention on Radio România Actualități (RRA), that, in the event that the CCR decides to cancel the first round of the presidential elections, Romanians will be called to the polls again, for the first round of the elections, on December 15, with the second round to be organized on December 29. At the same time, the head of the AEP announced that some counties will finish the recount of votes requested by the CCR today.

“From the information we have, some counties will finish the recount of votes today and the result will be communicated as soon as possible to the Constitutional Court, so that it can make the decision to validate the elections or invalidate the November 24 election and organize a first round of voting for the presidential election on December 15, with the second round to be held on December 29, a date that causes us many inconveniences in terms of organizing the elections,” Toni Greblă told RRA.

Asked what constitutes major vote fraud, so that the CCR decides to cancel the first presidential election, Greblă said that the order of the voting results should be radically changed. “So, a difference that changes the order of political competitors, meaning the one in first place moves to seventh place and the one in sixth place would move to second place. I don’t know… So, the order of establishing the voting results is radically changed,” said Toni Greblă.

The head of the AEP expressed hope that a decision by the CCR will be made as quickly as possible, because a number of technical aspects regarding the organization of the elections depend on the Court’s decision.

“However, I hope that this decision will come as quickly as possible, because there are some technical operations to be carried out before the possible second round, because the ballots must be printed, they must be transported in the country, throughout the country, they must be taken to the city halls, they must be taken to the polling stations, training must be carried out with the members of the electoral bureaus, and so on.”

“The Central Electoral Bureau has set the deadline for December 1, 10:00 p.m. I hope that most counties, especially small counties, will finish during the day today and maybe tomorrow by noon we will have them all. I repeat, in large counties there are many ballots to count, and the staff of the County Electoral Offices is relatively small”, explained the AEP president, who then emphasized: “We are technically able to organize the elections. However, for now we do not know how to print the ballots for the second round, because the first round has not been validated”.

Three big question marks related to the vote recount