Less than a third of Romanians planning to vote in EU election. Rest of Europe, not doing much better

More than half of Romanians with a right to vote declared that they are interested in the elections for the European Parliament and less than a third are determined to go and vote on Sunday, May 25, according to a CURS survey.

The survey results show that 52 percent of Romanians of voting age are interested and very interested in the election for the European Parliament on Sunday. Only 28 percent of them are planning on voting.

Out of them, 44 percent would vote with PSD-UNPR-PC alliance. Pnl comes in second with 17 percent of votes, followed by PDL – 14 percent, PMP – 8 percent and UDMR – 6 percent.

The survey was carried out in 16-18 May on a sample of 2,000 people.

Read the results of another survey on the Romanian EU Elections and their appeal, this time performed by INSCOP.

Read more about

Study: Romanians prefer gray cars and aren’t interested in bright colors

read more

Europeans pessimistic about election turnout

Elections for the European Parliament are held once every 5 years. Turnout in the EP elections has steadily declined over three decades from 62 percent in the first election in 1979 to 43 percent in the 2009 election. There is great concern that the legitimacy of the European Union is at stake should there be a further slide in voter turnout.

Romania registered a participation rate of 27.21 percent in 2009. Although the percentage is low, it’s not as low as in the case of Slovakia, where only 19.6 percent of the population showed up to vote who will represent them in the European Parliament (in the previous election in 2004, the turnout was even lower, at 14 percent).

“The problem of low turnout applies not only to Slovakia, but to the entire region of central and eastern Europe, the young democracies, which comparatively recently emerged from the communist bloc. To the west of the continent, democracy is much more rooted”, says Jerzy Buzek, the former Polish prime minister and president of the European parliament in 2009-12, quoted by Telegraph.

According to an analysis performed by European think-tank Bruegel, voter turnout will likely fall from 43 percent in 2009 to between 38 and 40 percent. The higher turnout of 40 percent would reflect some expectation of relief of national fiscal distress from Europe.

Countries like Belgium and Luxembourg will lead the way with turnouts of 94.29 percent and 83.19 percent, respectively. The rest of Europe and EU members are not estimated to attract more than 50 percent of the population to the voting booths.

“It is a minimal interest in European themes”, says George Mioc, MEP candidate