First instance body dealing with electoral disputes

Art. 24. – (1) The Constitutional Court shall cancel the elections if votingand result ascertainment took place based on fraud apt to modify the assignmentof the mandate or, as the case may be, the order of the candidates who mayparticipate in the second round. If such is the case, the Court shall order theround to be repeated on the second Sunday following the date of electioncancellation.

(2) The parties orcandidates having participated in the elections may file a petition forelection cancellation no later than 3 days from the closure of voting; thepetition shall need to be motivated and accompanied by the evidence it isgrounded on.

(3) The petition may onlybe admitted if the person having notified the facts is not involved in thisfraud.

(4) The ConstitutionalCourt shall solve the petition before the date set by the law for makingelection results public.

 Art. 25.– (1) The Constitutional Court shall publish the election results in the pressand in the Official Gazette of Romania, Part I, for each round, and shallvalidate the election results for the elected president.

(2) The validation documentshall be drawn up in 3 copies, one of which shall stay with the ConstitutionalCourt, another one shall be sent to the Parliament for the oath to be taken asstipulated by article 82 (2) of the Constitution of Romania, republished, andthe third shall be handed over to the candidate elect.

Art. 26. – (1) The second round shall take place under the conditions stipulatedunder article 81 (3) of the Constitution of Romania, republished, two weeksafter the first round, in the same polling stations and constituencies, withthe election operations being run by the same election bureaux and based on thesame electoral lists as the first round.

(2) In the second roundshall participate only the first 2 candidates who have obtained the highestnumber of votes, validly cast for the entire country, in the first round. TheConstitutional Court shall acknowledge that number no later than 24 hours fromreceiving the written reports stipulated under article 23 (3), by making publicthe full names of the two candidates to participate in the second round and thevoting date set according to paragraph (1).

Law on the Election of thePresident of Romania no. 370/2004 was published in the Official Gazette ofRomania, Part I, no. 887 of 29 September 2004 and amended by GovernmentEmergency Ordinance no. 77/2004, published in the Official Gazette of Romania,Part I, no. 920 of 9 October 2004. http://www.lexadin.nl/wlg/legis/nofr/eur/lxwerom.htm

“The Constitutional Court,according to Art. 24.4 of the election law, shall resolve complaints by thedate set by law for making the election results public. Such a date is clearlyestablished with regards to the first round (Art. 26.2), but not for the secondround. Under previous legislation, the date could be established in conjunctionwith the parliamentary elections law that was applied concurrently; subsequentamendments have resulted in a gap in the law.

The Constitutional Courtvalidates the elections and ensures the publication of the results in the mediaand the Official Gazette. Political parties and candidates that participated inthe election may, within three days of the closing of the polls, file petitions with theConstitutional Court requestingthe annulment of the election, in case they believe fraud was committedto such an extent that it could potentially have altered the order of thecandidates to contest the second round or the allocation of the presidentialmandate.”

OSCE/ODIHR Limited ElectionObservation Mission Final Report, Romania Presidential Election of 22 Novemberand 6 December 2009, 17 February, 2010

ThePermanent Electoral Authority is the highest-level electoral management body.