Radio România Internațional

Tag: polling stations

  • Preparations for the elections abroad

    Preparations for the elections abroad

     

    After the local and European parliamentary elections, held simultaneously on June 9, Romanians are preparing for an election marathon. They will vote three Sundays in a row, on November 24 and December 8 for the presidential elections and on December 1, on Romania’s National Day, for the legislative elections. Leaders of the parliamentary parties, representatives of marginal or independent factions, make up the 14 candidates for the position of head of state. One of them will replace the incumbent president, Klaus Iohannis, whose second and last presidential mandate to which the Constitution entitled him to, expires next month.

     

    As regards Parliament, there are 330 deputy and 136 senator positions at stake, for which thousands of people are competing. About 200 envelopes with postal votes for the parliamentary and presidential elections have already been received and are “on hold” until the moment when the votes cast at the ballot boxes will be counted, the president of the Permanent Election Authority (AEP), Toni Grebla, explained. He added that 6,650 citizens received envelopes to vote by mail and they must send their option no later than two days before the start of physical voting, in order to be received on time. If they report having voted incorrectly by mail, they can cast their vote at the nearest polling station in their country of residence.

     

    Toni Grebla, alongside the Minister of Foreign Affairs, Luminiţa Odobescu, held a press conference on the topic of elections abroad. Greblă recalled that Romania has a record number of polling stations set up for the Romanian Diaspora, 950. Minister Odobescu warned that there are 11 polling stations with different addresses in the three rounds of elections, in Finland, France, Spain and Britain. She also mentioned that the address of some polling stations in Spain has changed, due to the recent catastrophic floods there.

     

    Odobescu has called on the Romanian citizens abroad to check the list of polling stations and to carry with them the documents they need in order to be allowed to vote – an identity card or passport, valid on the day of voting. All polling stations abroad will be permanently video monitored, the minister also said. The distribution of the ballot papers for the first round of the presidential and parliamentary elections, as well as of the other materials, such as control stamps, stamps with the mention ‘VOTE’ and the minutes recording the voting results, ends this week. Voting abroad in the first round of the presidential elections will unfold over three days: Friday, November 22, between 12 p.m. and 9 p.m. local time, Saturday, November 23, and Sunday, November 24, between 7 a.m. and 9 p.m. local time.

  • October 30, 2024

    October 30, 2024

    PROJECT Ten big Romanian cities have been included in a European project, aimed at turning them smarter and more environmentally-friendly by 2035. Following a selection made by experts with the M 100 Climate Neutrality Forum, Bucharest, Alba Iulia and Brasov in Central Romania, Constanta in the south-east, Iasi in the est and Oradea in the west are going to receive support to curb their gas-emissions and turn these cities in smart, green cities. The M100 forum, underway in Bucharest these days, is an event, designed to offer a debate platform for good practices in the field of sustainability.

     

    VOTE The Romanian Ministry of Foreign Affairs has sent to the Permanent Election Authority a series of proposals regarding the 950 polling stations abroad for the upcoming elections for the presidential seat, the Senate and the Chamber of Deputies. As compared to the election on June 9th, which had 915 polling stations, 35 additional ones are going to be added for the upcoming election. The most polling stations are going to be in Italy and Malta, 158; Spain will have 147, the UK 107, France and Monaco 68, the Republic of Moldova 59, the United States 48. As in the case of the European Parliamentary election on June 9th, out of objective reasons, polling stations could not be mounted in Afghanistan, as the Romanian troops have been pulled out from that country, Romania’s consular office in Rostov-on-Don is being closed down, in Odessa, as the consular office there has been temporarily suspended, the Sudan, Venezuela, Libya and North Korea. The Romanians abroad are going to cast their ballots on three days, November 22, 23 and 24, as well as on 6, 7, 8 of December.

     

    FAIR The best known event in Romania’s agricultural and food industry, Indagra & Indagra Food kicks off in Bucharest today. Over 500 companies out of 25 countries are attending the event bringing along 150 innovations and products. The international Fair of products and equipment for agriculture, horticulture, wine growing and animal breeding, Indagra 2024, is showcasing the innovations shaping the future of agriculture. From state-of-the-art equipment to technological solutions aimed at improving productivity, the event is the right place where farmers, entrepreneurs and those interested in agriculture can find good solutions for a sustainable future – the organizers say. Indagra is open until Sunday, November 3.

     

    DEFENCE Norway contributes 127 million dollars to the purchase of a system of Patriot missiles for Romania – the country’s Minister of Defence, Angel Tilvar has announced. According to him the initiative is part of an immediate action in terms of anti-aircraft defence, coordinated by Germany and will allow Romania to strengthen security and defence in the Euro-Atlantic space by renewing and expanding the air defence capabilities. We recall that Romania has recently donated a Patriot missile system to the neighbouring Ukraine invaded by the Russian troops.

     

    (bill)

  • The election period begins in Romania

    The election period begins in Romania

    The election period for the presidential elections in Romania begins this week, according to the calendar approved by the Bucharest Government. On September 12, the five judges with the High Court of Cassation and Justice, who will be part of the Central Election Bureau (BEC) for the presidential elections, will be elected by secret ballot. A day later, the president of the BEC will be appointed, as well as the members of the political formations that are not represented in Parliament and that proposed presidential candidates. Also, on September 14 at the latest, the Central Election Bureau will be completed with the president and vice-presidents of the Permanent Election Authority and with one representative of each parliamentary political party.

     

    September 24 is the date by which Romanian citizens domiciled or residing abroad can submit requests to vote by mail. The calendar also provides that, by September 28, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs will be informed about the localities abroad where polling stations must be established, as well as their number. No later than October 5th, the presidential candidacies will be submitted.

     

    It is expected that the current Prime Minister Marcel Ciolacu, from the Social Democrats, the current Speaker of the Senate, Nicolae Ciucă, from the Liberals and the President of the Save Romania Union, Elena Lasconi, will enter the election race for the most important position in the Romanian state. The head of the Alliance for the Union of Romanians, George Simion, the leader of the Democratic Union of Ethnic Hungarians in Romania, Kelemen Hunor, as well as several representatives of non-parliamentary parties and independent candidates, among whom stands out the former NATO Deputy Secretary General, Mircea Geoană, who ended his mandate on Tuesday, are also expected to run for president.

     

    Until October 10, the process of establishing the candidacies takes place, and until October 12, the order of the candidates’ names on the ballot will be established. The election campaign will start in Romania on October 25. The voting process in the first round of the presidential elections will start abroad on November 22. Romanians in the Diaspora will vote until November 24, when citizens with the domicile or residence in the country will be asked to cast their ballot.

     

    By November 29, the names of the two candidates who will participate in the second round of voting will be announced, and on the same day the election campaign will start again. The second round of the elections for the president of Romania will start abroad on December 6 and, just like in the first round, Romanians abroad will have 3 days to express their political option. In the country, Romanians will go to the polls on December 8th. According to the Permanent Election Authority, the total number of citizens entitled to vote, registered in the Election Register at the end of August, was almost 19 million, of which about 960,000 had their domicile or residence abroad.

     

  • Preparations for the vote in the Diaspora

    Preparations for the vote in the Diaspora

    In the last few years Romanians
    living in the Diaspora have hit polling stations early in the morning on
    election day, to make sure they manage to exercise their constitutional right.
    Huge waiting lines cropped up outside embassies, consular offices or cultural
    institutes in many European cities, with Romanians having to wait hours on end
    to be able to cast their vote. One reason behind this is the high number of
    Romanians choosing to live, study or work abroad in recent years. Another
    reason, however, was the deficient election law, which has been recently
    modified ahead of the presidential election due in November.

    Under the new law,
    Romanians abroad will be able to vote during the course of three days, from
    Friday till Sunday, while Romanians in the country will hit the polling
    stations only on Sunday. Besides, Romanians abroad have had the possibility of expressing
    their intentions regarding the voting procedure, by filling on online form on
    votstrainatate.ro. Romanians could opt either for postal voting, or for voting
    in one of the polling stations set up abroad. Moreover, new voting stations
    will be set up in light of data obtained on the website, provided over 100
    Romanians in the same town or area have signed up.

    As a result, Romanians who
    have signed up abroad will be removed from voter lists in Romania and inscribed
    on the list of permanent voters abroad, which simplifies the voting process
    significantly, as members of election committees will no longer have to fill
    the personal data of each voter by hand. The online registration deadline was
    September 15, but a mere 41,000 Romanians signed up for postal voting while
    39,000 for voting in a polling station. By way of comparison, in the European
    Parliament election held in May, some 370,000 Romanians were able to cast their
    vote. One of the main elements that deterred Romanians to register online was
    the fact that their personal data could end up at the National Agency for
    Fiscal Administration. The president of the Permanent Election Authority,
    Constantin-Florin Mituletu-Buica, has repeatedly stated that the personal data
    of Romanians who register online for the presidential election will be used
    exclusively for that purpose, while any misinformation in that respect is aimed
    at deterring people from exercising their right to vote. The difference between
    the two figures has prompted many to expect the same endless waiting lines for
    the presidential election as well.


    (Translated by V. Palcu)