Post date: Jul 29, 2012 11:37:38 PM
BUCHAREST, ROMANIA (JULY 29, 2012) (REUTERS) - Turnout in a Romanian referendum to remove President Traian Basescu from office was 46 percent, the election bureau said on Sunday (July 29), meaning the vote was not valid because it was short of a 50 percent threshold.
A referendum vote to impeach the Romanian president falls short of the threshold required for its validity.
Exit polls showed more than 80 percent voted to impeach Basescu but he would remain in office because of the turnout requirement.
At a news conference on Sunday Basescu said he'd been vindicated by a 'stay at home' response to the poll, making the referendum proposed by parliamentarians, invalid.
"Romanians, through their vote, which was not for me, voted for Romania. They voted in low numbers and according to their consciences. The majority stayed at home. Through this way they manifested their will, they consolidated the idea that Romania cannot return to a society led by somebody's whim, without rules, to the society led by a group of politicians deciding the fate of Romanians," he said.
The efforts, by Prime Minister Victor Ponta's leftist Social Liberal Union (USL) to unseat Basescu have already brought a stern dressing-down from the European Union, which accused him of undermining the rule of law and intimidating judges.
Ponta, whose government took office in May, has suspended Basescu and held the referendum to seek popular backing for his impeachment for overstepping his powers. The president is unpopular for backing austerity and for perceptions of cronyism.
Basescu initially urged Romanians to vote against what he called a coup d'etat, but this week he changed his mind and he and his allies, the opposition Democrat Liberal Party (PDL), asked supporters to boycott the referendum, citing concern about the possibility of electoral fraud.
"I'm assuring Romanians that once I will return to Cotroceni (the presidential palace), I will try to sort things out, to generate a feeling of reconciliation in society. It's clear for me that a lot of Romanians have the feelings of dissatisfaction, generated by what happened in the past few years and, at the same time, I have the conviction that the fracturing of our society has to be stopped," he said on Sunday.
Romania has made progress since the 1989 overthrow of communist dictator Nicolae Ceausescu and joined the EU in 2007, but the economy slipped back into recession in the first quarter of this year and pockets of severe poverty remain.
Ponta felt the full weight of EU wrath after his government took on the Constitutional Court, threatening to replace judges and reduce its powers, and ignoring one of its decisions. Brussels said it was concerned about the government's respect for the rule of law, democratic procedures and the judiciary.
The row over Basescu has delayed policymaking, sent the leu currency plunging to record lows, and pushed up borrowing costs. It also raised concern about the future of Romania's 5 billion euro ($6.2 billion) International Monetary Fund-led aid deal.
The IMF has said it will begin a two-week review of the deal on July 31, a week later than planned because of the impeachment referendum.