A far-right and little-known NATO critic has won the first round of Romania’s presidential election after polls predicted he would win less than 10% of the vote.
Calin Georgescu, an independent candidate, won with a 22.95% share, seeing off the incumbent prime minister Marcel Ciolacu of the Social Democratic Party (PSD), who had been the clear favourite to win the first round.
Mr Georgescu, 62, will face off against reformist Elena Lasconi of the centre-right Save Romania Union in a run-off on 8 December. She won 19.17% of the vote.
It is the first time in Romania‘s 35-year post-communist history that the leftist PSD has not had a candidate in the second round of a presidential race.
The result threatens the country’s staunchly pro-Ukraine stance. Mr Georgescu has refused to explicitly say whether he supports Russia but has said Romania’s best chance lies with “Russian wisdom”.
Romania is a member of NATO and the European Union.
The president serves a five-year term and has significant decision-making powers in areas including defence spending, national security, foreign policy and judicial appointments.
The result highlights voters’ anti-establishment sentiment. In a Facebook post, Mr Georgescu said he voted “for the unjust, for the humiliated, for those who feel they do not matter and actually matter the most… the vote is a prayer for the nation”.
The campaign also focused on the soaring cost of living, with Romania having the EU’s largest share of people at risk of poverty.
Some 9.4 million people, around 52.5% of eligible voters, cast their ballots before polls closed on Sunday.
According to his website, Mr Georgescu holds a doctorate in pedology, a branch of soil science, and held different positions in Romania’s environment ministry in the 1990s.
Between 1999 and 2012, he was a representative for Romania on the national committee of the United Nations Environment Programme.
Mr Georgescu does not have a clear political agenda but has promised generous spending and no tax hikes. His videos on TikTok are also popular, amassing 1.7 million likes.
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Ms Lasconi, a former journalist, has been running on an anti-corruption reformist agenda. She has also supported increased defence spending and continued aid to Ukraine.
If she wins the final vote, she will be the first female president in Romania’s history.
Romania will also hold parliamentary elections on 1 December that will determine the country’s next government and prime minister.
One political commentator said Russian meddling to give Mr Georgescu an edge could not be ruled out in the election.
“Based on Georgescu’s stance towards Ukraine and the discrepancy between opinion surveys and the actual result, we cannot rule [that] out,” said Sergiu Miscoiu, a political science professor at Babes-Bolyai University.