[58] IRAN THUMBS NOSE AT IAEA

[59] IRANIAN LEGISLATORS DUBIOUS ABOUT NUCLEAR DEVELOPMENTS

[60] CONSTRUCTION OF IRAN-ARMENIA GAS PIPELINE BEGINS

[61] SECURITY OPERATIONS IN KURDISH REGION CONTINUE

[62] SABOTAGE UNDERCUTS IRAQI OIL FIELD OUTPUT

[63] MANILA NEGOTIATES WITH IRAQI KIDNAPPERS

[64] IRAQI GROUPS HAVE MIXED VIEWS ON ELECTION BOYCOTT

End Note

[65] ROMANIA'S ELECTORATE MIGHT LEAD POLITICIANS TO RETHINK FUTURE

Calls by the main Romanian opposition alliance Justice and Truth to annul the results of the 28 November presidential and parliamentary elections might well be justified, but they served to shift the focus of debate away from the elections' significance to alleged infringements of democratic procedure. One must bear in mind that even if all the claims of Justice and Truth -- an alliance formed by the National Liberal Party (PNL) and the Democratic Party -- are found to be justified, the rival Social Democratic Party (PSD)-Humanist Party (PUR) will still be ahead in the parliamentary ballot, albeit by less than one percentage point. Likewise, PSD presidential candidate and current Prime Minister Adrian Nastase will still hold a slight lead over Traian Basescu, Justice and Truth's candidate. The opposition's allegations should be thoroughly investigated and those found guilty of any infractions should be punished, but in any event the essence of the message the Romanian electorate sent to politicians in the elections will remain intact.

With all the votes counted, the PSD -- which ran as it did in 2000 in alliance with the PUR -- is slightly ahead in the parliamentary ballot. Results put the PSD-PUR alliance in front, with 36.61 percent of the vote in the lower house of parliament (Chamber of Deputies), and 37.13 percent in the upper house (Senate). Premier Nastase, and his PSD-designated successor as prime minister, Foreign Minister Mircea Geoana, both rushed to proclaim victory. But does the PSD-PUR really have grounds to celebrate? Compared to the 2000 electoral outcome (36.1 percent in the Chamber of Deputies, 37.09 percent in the Senate), the PSD has by and large merely managed to hold ground.

What is more, the PSD might not be able to either form a coalition majority or rule again as a minority government with the parliamentary backing of the Hungarian Democratic Federation of Romania (UDMR), as it has since 2000. This is both because the legislature shrunk as a result of a population drop and because fewer votes stemming from parties that did not pass the 5 percent threshold are available for redistribution among parties that gained representation. At this stage, it appears that the PSD-PUR will have 57 seats in the Senate (compared to 65 in 2000) out of a total of 137. The UDMR is likely to have some 11 seats in that chamber, one fewer than four years earlier, thus combining to fall one seat short of a majority. A hung parliament is looming on horizon.

The opposition Truth and Justice alliance is the virtual winner of the ballot. If one sums up the PNL and the Democratic Party's performance in 2000 (when they ran on separate lists) and compares it to their 2004 achievement, the difference becomes obvious: 14.52 percent (lower house) and 15.06 percent (upper house) in 2000, compared to 31.33 and 31.77 percent in 2004. In other words, while the ruling party has merely equaled its 2000 performance, the opposition alliance has more than doubled its representation. But Truth and Justice failed in its main mission -- to dislodge the PSD as the ruling party.

The PSD can thus claim with some justification that it has not fared poorly, considering that ruling parties are often targeted for criticism by the electorate come election time. Yet to claim, as Prime Minister Nastase has, that this election is unique is incorrect. In the Czech Republic, for instance, the Social Democratic Party managed to retain its plurality in the June 2002 elections, despite suffering losses and barely managing to form a coalition afterwards. Thus, it is the opposition Truth and Justice alliance that has the right to claim a moral victory. But moral victories do not forge ruling coalitions.

Unethical practices, however, sometimes do. Viewed from this perspective, the most obvious partners for the PSD to lure into its ranks are likely to be found among Greater Romania Party (PRM) lawmakers. The extremist PRM is the most obvious loser of the 2004 election, having been cut to its "natural" size by the Romanian electorate. While in 2000 the party culled a frightening 19.48 percent of the vote for the Chamber of Deputies and 21.01 percent for the Senate, four years on it managed just 12.92 percent and 13.63 percent in the two chambers, respectively. The reasons are obvious: PRM Chairman Corneliu Vadim Tudor's "metamorphosis" into a philo-Semitic moderate Christian Democrat cost him the nationalist electorate and left the democratic camp unconvinced. It is precisely for this reason that, as a whole, the PRM -- the only party with which the PSD-PUR could form a somewhat stable majority -- is not considered a viable partner for the ruling party. However, while the PSD might avoid an open partnership with the extremist party for fear of being internationally seen as guilty by association with Tudor (as was the case between 1992-95), it might well attempt to lure PRM parliamentarians away from the PRM leader. The most obvious candidates would be those members of the National Syndicate Bloc who ran on the PRM lists in the 2004 elections; other PRM parliamentarians might join them as well.

An additional (but not necessarily alternative) source of parliamentary support might be sought by the PSD among any Democratic Party parliamentarians who are unhappy with the ideologically odd alliance of their social-democratic formation with the PNL. Outgoing Prime Minister Nastase has already hinted at such a scenario. However, most of the Democrats who are unhappy with the alliance have either already left the party or were forced out by Chairman Traian Basescu.

The ethnic Hungarian UDMR, meanwhile, essentially repeated its 2000 performance, despite challenges from within the party and the desertion of Hungarian Civic Union members who ran on the lists of the Popular Alliance. But the UDMR would apparently not be enough this time around to secure the PSD-PUR a majority, regardless of whether it participates in the next government (as UDMR Chairman Bela Marko suggested it would like to) or supports it in parliament, as was the case in 2000-04.

Much will therefore depend on the outcome of the presidential runoff, slated for 12 December. Nastase is ahead of Basescu (40.94 as compared to 33.92 percent of the votes counted thus far), but runoffs have their own rules. In 1996, Emil Constantinescu was trailing Ion Iliescu by four percentage points after the first round, yet won the runoff with a majority of 54.41 percent. Who Romania's next president will be could determine the shape of the next government. In the absence in the legislature of any majority party, the constitution grants the president the right to designate as prime minister anyone who has a reasonable chance of forming a majority. In other words, should Basescu win, designating PNL-Democratic Party candidate for the post Calin Popescu-Tariceanu as prime minister is a distinct possibility. But Popescu-Tariceanu would likely find himself in the same situation as would the PSD's prime-ministerial candidate, Mircea Geoana -- unable to lean on any majority in parliament.

It is doubtful whether a polarized Romania would be able to accept a system of cohabitation in which one party controls the presidency and an opposing party controls the cabinet -- but the electorate might force such a situation upon itself. Even if this scenario does not pan out, a realistic solution seems to be one of a "grand coalition" that would be able to depend on a comfortable majority in the face of the country's efforts to join the European Union and to implement urgently needed reforms. This solution would entail having the PSD grant the PNL-Democratic Party's Truth and Justice alliance control over the most corruption-ridden portfolios of the current ruling party's government -- those of finance, trade, and other reform-related fields, as well as the Justice Ministry.

Would Romania's political class be capable of overcoming such divisions? The attempt by the PNL-Democratic Party alliance to have the elections canceled does not bode well, even if some electoral irregularities are striking. Romania cannot afford to become a "second Ukraine." To do so would be to take a great leap backward.

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