Romanian voters cast their ballots for a new parliament on Sunday, shortly after independent candidate Călin Georgescu’s surprise victory in the first round of the presidential election.
More than 18 million Romanian citizens, including those living abroad, can vote to elect 332 parliamentarians to the Chamber of Deputies and 137 to the Senate.
A total of 18,968 polling stations in Romania’s 42 electoral districts opened at 07:00 a.m. local time and will close at 9:00 p.m. In addition, 950 polling stations abroad are open on Saturday and Sunday.
More than 8,000 candidates, mainly from the Social Democratic Party (SDP), SOS Romania, National Liberal Party (PNL), Alliance for the Union of Romanians, Force of the Right, Democratic Union of Hungarians in Romania (UDMR) and the National Salvation Union, are running for seats in the parliament.
To gain representation in parliament, parties must win at least 5 per cent of votes nationwide or more than 20 per cent of votes in at least four electoral districts.
Romania’s parliamentary elections are taking place between the two rounds of the presidential election, a week after an unprecedented ruling by the Constitutional Court to recount the votes cast in the first round.
