BUCHAREST, Romania (AP) — A top Romanian court on Tuesday rejected an appeal by far-right politician Calin Georgescu to lift a ban on his candidacy in the presidential rerun. He won the first round of last year’s race before the same court annulled the election.
The ruling by the Constitutional Court in the capital Bucharest, which was unanimous, came two days after the Central Election Bureau rejected Georgescu’s candidacy for the May election.
It wasn’t immediately clear on what grounds the court made Tuesday’s decision, which is final.
Hundreds of Georgescu supporters who had gathered near the court, many waving Romanian flags, responded by chanting “Thieves!”
The bureau had cited in its decision on Sunday the Constitutional Court’s ruling last year to cancel the elections after allegations of electoral violations and that Russia had run a coordinated online campaign to promote Georgescu, who ran as an independent. The decision to cancel the election was made two days before the Dec. 8 runoff.
Georgescu had denounced his ban on Sunday as “a direct blow to the heart of democracy worldwide” and said, “Europe is now a dictatorship, Romania is under tyranny!”
The court’s decision on Tuesday is likely to inflame tensions in the European Union and in the NATO member country, which has been gripped by a protracted political crisis since the election was canceled last year.
The first round of the rerun is scheduled for May 4. If no candidate wins more than 50% of the ballots, a runoff will follow on May 18.
