Romanian prime minister Victor Ponta has announced that he decided to step down from the leadership of his Social Democratic Party (PSD) until he proves his innocence against the charges anti-graft prosecutors have issued against him. He made the statement weeks after the National Anti-Corruption Department (DNA) launched a graft investigation against him, prompting insisting calls - including President Klaus Iohannis' - for him to step down as head of government, which he has rejected so far.
UPDATE PSD interim president Rovana Plumb later today said Ponta did not resign, but stepped down temporarily as head of the party. She said Ponta's resignation as prime minister was out of the question as it would provoke a "major political crisis". And she said she would serve as interim until the next party congress, which is due next year.
Update: Bucharest Mayor Nicusor Dan won the Romanian presidential election on May 18, according to the official vote count. With 98.5% of the ballots counted, Nicusor Dan had 54.17% of the votes, 900,000 more than his opponent, nationalist George Simion. A record turnout both in the country and abroad helped Dan come back from 1.88 million […]
Romanians showed up in record numbers to vote in the second round of the presidential elections, both in the country and abroad. The exit poll results presented on Sunday evening pointed to a strong lead for Bucharest’s pro-EU mayor Nicusor Dan (54%-46%), but are only relevant for the domestic vote. Both candidates claimed victory in […]
Romanians showed up in large numbers to vote in the second round of the country’s presidential elections, one of the most important democratic tests Romania has seen in the last three decades. At 14:00, exactly halfway through the voting process in the country, over 5.63 million Romanians have cast their votes, compared with 4.52 million […]
Romanians abroad have mobilized massively to vote in the second round of the country’s presidential elections. Update: By Sunday afternoon (15:00 Bucharest time), over 1.2 million Romanians have voted abroad for the country's next president. That's some 220,000 more votes than the overall total in the first round. The countries with the largest turnout are […]
Romanians abroad have mobilized massively to vote in the second round of the country’s presidential elections. The vote in Diaspora started on Friday morning, and by Saturday evening (at 19:00), over 609,000 Romanians had already cast their votes. The turnout is almost 90% higher than the one recorded at the same time in the first […]
It's almost impossible to think about anything not related to elections this weekend but if you should need some distraction, there are options. Happening now is the European Film Festival, screening recent productions from the continent, very varied in theme, tone, and genre. The fest is playing Bucharest, Sfântu Gheorghe and Timișoara until Sunday and […]
