Romanian legislative election, 2004

Infobox Election
election_name = Romanian legislative election, 2004
country = Romania
type = parliamentary
ongoing = no
party_colour = no
previous_election = Romanian legislative election, 2000
previous_year = 2000
next_election = Romanian legislative election, 2008
next_year = 2008
seats_for_election = All 332 seats in The Chamber of Deputies
All 137 seats in The Senate
election_date = 28 November 2004

colour1 = ED2E38
nominee1 =
leader1 = Mircea Geoana
leader_since1 =
party1 = National Union PSD+PUR
home_state1 =
leaders_seat1 =
running_mate1 =
last_election1 =
seats_needed1 =
electoral_vote1 =
states_carried1 =
seats1 = 132
57
seat_change1 =
popular_vote1 = 3,730,352
3,798,607
percentage1 = 36.8%
37.2%
swing1 =

colour2 = FF8000
nominee2 =
leader2 = Călin Popescu-Tăriceanu
leader_since2 =
party2 = Justice and Truth Alliance
home_state2 =
leaders_seat2 =
running_mate2 =
last_election2 =
seats_needed2 =
electoral_vote2 =
states_carried2 =
seats2 = 112
49
seat_change2 =
popular_vote2 = 3,191,546
3,250,663
percentage2 = 31.5%
31.8%
swing2 =

colour3 = 025AD0
nominee3 =
leader3 =
leader_since3 =
party3 = Greater Romania Party
home_state3 =
leaders_seat3 =
running_mate3 =
last_election3 =
seats_needed3 =
electoral_vote3 =
states_carried3 =
seats3 = 48
21
seat_change3 =
popular_vote3 = 1,316,751
1,394,698
percentage3 = 13.0%
13.6%
swing3 =

colour4 = 15803C
nominee4 =
leader4 =
leader_since4 =
party4 = Democratic Union of Hungarians in Romania
home_state4 =
leaders_seat4 =
running_mate4 =
last_election4 =
seats_needed4 =
electoral_vote4 =
states_carried4 =
seats4 = 22
10
seat_change4 =
popular_vote4 = 628,125
637,109
percentage4 = 6.2%
6.2%
swing4 =

colour5 = D5D5D5
nominee5 =
leader5 =
leader_since5 =
party5 = Romanian ethnic minorities parties
home_state5 =
leaders_seat5 =
running_mate5 =
last_election5 =
seats_needed5 =
electoral_vote5 =
states_carried5 =
seats5 = 16 (1 each)
-
seat_change5 =
popular_vote5 =
-
percentage5 =
-
swing5 =

poll1_date =
poll1_source =
poll1_nominee1 =
poll1_party1 =
poll2_date =
poll2_source =
poll2_nominee1 =
poll2_party1 =
poll1_date =
poll1_source =
poll1_nominee2 =
poll1_party2 =
poll2_date =
poll2_source =
poll2_nominee2 =
poll2_party2 =
map_

---

map_size = 350px
map_caption = Map of the Romanian legislative election of 2004 based on the winning party at local level
title = Prime Minister
before_election = Adrian Năstase
Eugen Bejinariu (ad interim)
before_colour = ED2E38
after_election = Călin Popescu-Tăriceanu
after_colour = F2E125
before_party = Social Democratic Party (Romania)
after_party = National Liberal Party (Romania)

The Romanian legislative election of 2004 was held on November 28, 2004. 137 seats in the Senate of Romania and 314 seats in the Chamber of Deputies were up for election.

The 2004 legislative election was held simultaneously with the presidential election. According to the 2003 amendment to the Romanian Constitution, the presidential term is now five years instead of four, meaning that in the future, legislative and presidential elections will be held separately, only coinciding every 20 years (2024, 2044, etc.).

Contenders

The main contenders were the left-wing alliance made up of the incumbent Social Democratic Party of Romania (PSD) and the Romanian Humanist Party (PUR), and, on the other hand, the center-right "Justice and Truth" alliance ("Dreptate şi adevăr") comprising the liberal National Liberal Party (Romania) and the reformist Democratic Party (Romania).

Other significant contenders were the Greater Romania Party (PRM) (right-wing nationalists), the ethnic Hungarian party Democratic Union of Hungarians in Romania (UDMR), and the Union for Romanian Reconstruction, a group of right-wing technocrats.

Election result

Apart from the deputy seats up for grabs in the election, each ethnic minority group that has not gained representation in Parliament will be given one deputy seat - 18 seats in total.

Controversies

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thumb|right|225px|Map of the Romanian legislative election of 2004 based on the winning party at local level">
grey-other parties

The opposition alleged fraudulent use by the PSD of "supplementary lists", designed to help Romanians in transit to vote. Traditionally, Romanians voted with a cardboard identity card, which was stamped when they voted. Most Romanians now have laminated plastic IDs, to which a printed stamp is affixed when a person votes. However, the stamps can be easily removed.

The opposition claimed that there were organized "electoral excursions" of PSD supporters who were bussed to various towns to vote several times. This was corroborated by several teams of journalists, who followed the buses.

The Romanian opposition announced on November 30 that they were demanding a re-run of the election, because some of the void votes were allegedly awarded to the PSD. They showed evidence that some people voted more than once (they found about 750 persons in three counties, but their search of the supplementary lists would continue) and also showed that many of the minutes of the electoral committees were wrongly completed (the sum of the number of valid votes and null votes did not match the number of voters, sometimes by a difference of hundreds or thousands of votes) and the central software not only allowed these contradictory figures, but it also added these differences by default to the PSDFact|date=February 2007. The opposition announced that it had started a parallel count, which showed a PSD-DA difference of only 2% between.

The government attacked the opposition by arguing that 'rumours of fraud' affect Romania's economy and its external credibility.

In January 2005, the IMAS institute of statistics released an analysis of the voting results in the 16,824 precincts. In the top 1,000 precincts with the most votes on the supplementary lists, the PSD had 43% to the DA's 23%, while in the precincts with least votes on supplementary lists, the PSD had 30% to the DA's 34%. The same trend was true in the precincts with most void votes. [http://www.imas-inc.com/download/analize.pdf] It has been argued that this could not have been due to pure chance, and therefore that the alleged election fraud was real. Fact|date=February 2007

Government formation

No party holds an absolute majority, although PSD+PUR with UDMR and the other minorities hold a bare majority in the Chamber of the Deputies. On December 13, the PUR president Dan Voiculescu hinted that they have more in common with the DA (both have a center-right orientation) and that they might break from the PSD, but one day later said he will remain with PSD. It has been suggested by the press that this could be result of a blackmail about his communist past. By December 25 both UDMR and PUR signed a protocol of alliance with DA (Justice and Truth), with the designated prime minister being Călin Popescu-Tăriceanu. Thus, the PSD was left in opposition while Justice and Truth, the Democratic Union of Hungarians in Romania and the Humanist Party (now the Conservative Party) formed the government.

External links

* [http://www.bec2004.ro Central Electoral Bureau]
* [http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/4050361.stm BBC News - Fraud worries in Romanian poll]
* [http://www.osce.org/documents/odihr/2005/02/4281_en.pdf OSCE election report] (PDF, 350 KiB)