Bucharest Appeals Court Rejects NGOs’ Request To Suspend National Referendum

The court ruling can be appealed at the Supreme Court.

The lawyer representing non-government organizations Pro Democratia and the Press Monitoring Agency on Thursday said Romanians were not informed correctly on the advantages and disadvantages of a single-chamber Parliament, arguing they witnessed political propaganda rather than an information campaign.

The presidential administration, in turn, invoked two rulings of the Constitutional Court whereby there is no law banning the organization of elections and referendum on the same day and the president is entitled to consult people through referendum.

Early November, four Romanian non-government organizations called on the country’s ombudsman to notify the Constitution Court on potential breach of human rights, saying President Traian Basescu has the upper hand in election over other presidential contenders by appearing on two sets of electoral posters.

In October this year, Basescu signed the decree on organizing a national referendum to for a single-chamber Parliament with a maximum 300 lawmakers, despite the parliament’s vote of disapproval.

Basescu has been widely criticized for calling a referendum to downsize the Parliament on election day and his gesture was interpreted by political rivals as a scheme to get people to go to the polls and vote for him.

The Government allotted in September over 150 million lei (EUR1=RON4.2778) for this year’s presidential elections.

Late October, the budget of the Interior Ministry, which organizes and oversees the referendum in the country, was allotted a supplementary RON2.4 million from the budget reserve fund, while the National Statistics Institute received an additional RON3.6 million.