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| Romania’s Political Map after the Local Elections |
| (2012-06-13) |
| Last updated: 2012-06-14 12:56 EET |
Last Sunday’s local elections have retraced Romania’s political map, now dominated by the alliance that recently took over power – the Social Liberal Union made up of the Social Democratic Party, the National Liberal Party and the Conservative Party. The Union convincingly succeeded in turning their high pre-election approval rates into votes.
Moreover, it maintained the huge lead it had over its main rivals, the Liberal Democratic Party and the People’s Party. We recall that the Liberal Democratic Party played a fundamental role in the coalition that ruled the country until May, and now stands as the main opposition figure. The populist, extra-parliamentary People’s Party, generally viewed as an exotic presence on the local political scene came in 3rd.
The Social Liberal Union has won no less than 36 seats of county council president out of a total of 41. The big loser of the elections, the Liberal Democratic Party has only won 2, one in Arad and the second in Alba county, both in the west, as opposed to 14 in the 2008 elections. The Liberal Democrats’ junior partners in the former ruling coalition, the Democratic Union of Ethnic Hungarians in Romania and the National Union for the Progress of Romania have won only 3 counties.
The Ethnic Hungarians have won the two counties in the centre where they have traditionally been dominant, while the National Union for the Progress of Romania managed a surprising win in the eastern county of Neamt. However, things are slightly different as far as county capital mayors are concerned, where the Social Liberals’ victory, while still very clear, is not categorical.
Its candidates have won 28 cities and the Liberal Democrats 6, of which 3 are considered strategic: Cluj, Arad and Brasov. In the battle for Bucharest, the Social Liberals demolished the Liberal Democrats. The candidate of the former, Sorin Oprescu, though running as an independent, has easily won a new term in office. Moreover, the Union’s candidates won the mayor seat in 5 of the city’s 6 sectors, striking a final blow to the Liberal Democrats in the capital city.
The disastrous results have led to the resignation of the Liberal Democrat Bucharest leader, Elena Udrea, a former minister and an influential person within the party. Political analysts say the bitter defeat suffered by the Liberal Democrats is the result of the way in which they have handled the management of the country in recent years, ever since the start of the world economic crisis. The Social Liberal Union has managed to attract the election capital lost by the Liberal Democrats throughout this period.
However, the dominance of the Social Liberal Union after the local elections doesn’t guarantee a similar success in the legislative elections in autumn, elections where much more is at stake. It all depends on the performance of the Social Liberal government in the time left until these elections.
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