Gov't to request more electoral bureaus for polling stations

Prime Minister Ludovic Orban said on Monday that the government will request the Central Electoral Bureau to secure the number of members in the electoral bureaus of the polling stations in case the representatives of the political parties that no longer have candidates in the presidential runoff do not show up at the polling station. 

"I asked, especially at the polling stations abroad, that each chair of the polling station - obviously through the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and through the diplomatic corps - see what delegations of the political parties still participate in the vote. It is known that in the second round there are only two candidates and we need to check to what extent the delegates of the other political parties are still participating in the polling station's electoral bureaus, because the fluidisation of the voting procedure depends largely on the number of people and the number of tablet operators. We would like not to see the situation of long queues being created. In this respect, together with the chair of the AEP, we will ask the Central Electoral Bureau for a decision, an interpretation of the law, to allow additional electoral bureaus at the polling stations if the representatives of the parties that were represented in the first round and which no longer have candidates in the second round do not show up at the polling station," said Orban. 

He welcomed at the Government House representatives of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Special Telecommunications Service and the Permanent Electoral Authority to analyse how the presidential election was held in the first round and to evaluate the measures needed for the second round. 

Also, the prime minister said that he called for "urgent printing of the ballot papers." 

"Because it is very clear that transporting the ballot papers to the polling stations takes time. And that is why we requested that immediately after the Constitutional Court of Romania (CCR) validates the results of the first round, the Permanent Electoral Authority should make sure the ballot papers are printed so that we can send them to polling stations abroad," said Orban. 

He urged the Foreign Ministry "to ensure, exactly as it did in the first round, alternate staff to replace any member of the polling station's electoral bureau - chair, deputy - who does not attend the voting process." 

"Also, regarding the vote in the country, we asked for exemplary mobilisation of the forces of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, as in the first round. There are no new measures, but we try to solve in advance possible issues that may arise, so that they may not affect the conduct of the voting procedure under the best circumstances," said Orban.