Crin Antonescu, the candidate of the ruling coalition, leaves in the electoral race with over 90% of the mayors in Romania, as much as PSD-PNL-UDMR.
Photo Mediafax
At the 2009 presidential elections, Crin Antonescu obtained 20% alone. Now it is quoted at 20% being supported by three major parties. What will we sing more? Mobilization of mayors or 10 years of absence from public scene? “Adevărul” analyzes what changes would produce the choice of Crin Antonescu in Cotroceni.
Crin Antonescu became a candidate for presidential elections as a compromise solution between the three parties that form the ruling coalition: PSD, PNL, UDMR. A new candidacy of Marcel Ciolacu was compromised from the beginning, after, in November, he ranked third, behind Călin Georgescu and Elena Lasconi. Kelemen Hunor had no interest in applying, after the UDMR crossed the electoral threshold. It would have been a unnecessary political candidacy. And PNL had a choice between going on his own, with Ilie Bolojan candidate, or supporting a variant with the PSD and UDMR. Crin Antonescu was chosen as a common candidate.
The former PNL leader has the mayors of the three major parties in Romania, so over 90% of the administration. “If we mobilize in half our potential, we still gather 25% for Crin Antonescu. It is impossible not to enter the final. PSD must bring at least 13 percent, PNL – 8, and UDMR – 4. We also rely on the oratorical capacity demonstrated by lily over timeI, “say sources from the Liberal Campaign team. With 25%, Crin Antonescu could enter the second round, but the competition is very close. The opinion polls show a shoulder fight between Nicușor Dan, Victor Ponta and Crin Antonescu for the second place. On the first position is at least 5 percent.
At the 2009 presidential elections, Crin Antonescu, from the PNL candidate position, managed to obtain 20% with the slogan “Revolution of the common sense”. He ranked third, after Traian Basescu and Mircea Geoană, so the revolution postponed. Now, with 20%, it could take the presidential final, but it needs to mobilize the mayors. Or, at the November elections, Marcel Ciolacu (PSD) and Nicolae Ciucă (PNL), the candidates who had the most elected local ones, ranked only on the three and five places.
At the same time, Crin Antonescu goes into the competition and with an image deficit: he has been missing from public life in the last 10 years. After breaking the USL, in 2014, Crin Antonescu was replaced by PNL with Klaus Iohannis in the presidential elections, and Antonescu went to Brussels, along with his wife, Adina Vălean, at that time. “Antonescu’s campaign is summarized as follows: either they will pull it up the mayors or pull it down the past”, Say, for the truth, one of his campaign coordinators.
The only pro-Ciolacu candidate
Crin Antonescu is the only candidate for the presidential elections that does not promise the Government change. “Marcel Ciolacu is his strongest supporter in coalition”I support the sources quoted. At the same time, Ciolacu’s image, eroded in the last two years of government, implicitly affects the candidacy of Crin Antonescu, entered the competition from the position of candidate of the ruling coalition. Therefore, if he will be elected president, Crin Antonescu will keep the current parliamentary majority, with the PSD. Marcel Ciolacu in the role of prime minister.
In contrast, if Antonescu loses the presidential election, the ruling coalition will break down, as the UDMR leader Kelemen Hunor even announced. The future president will appoint a new prime minister to form a government. Therefore, the future of Marcel Ciolacu at the head of the government depends in a overwhelming proportion on the result of Crin Antonescu. And the success of Crin Antonescu is largely based on the mobilization of the mayors, especially those in the PSD, very organized.
However, the one who could block Crin Antonescu’s ascension to the Cotroceni Palace could be just a social-democrat: Victor Ponta. The former prime minister has entered the race for Cotroceni as an independent, but will break a consistent part of the PSD votes, given that, for the first time in history, the party does not have its own presidential candidate. At this moment, Crin Antonescu and Victor Ponta, former allies in 2012, are fighting for the presidential final.
Also, Crin Antonescu’s score will also be influenced by the movements in the USR area. The party was to give up Elena Lasconi and announced that she was supporting Nicușor Dan for Cotroceni. Theoretically, the movement could help Nicușor Dan to gather more votes in the reformist area. On the other hand, Lasconi has his loyal voters, who reject the mayor from the beginning. However, given that the qualification in the final can be decided in several thousand votes, as in November, any broken slice by Victor Ponta from PSD or Elena Lasconi from Nicușor Dan can make the difference between qualifying in the second round and the political non -political.
