Exit poll gives liberal candidate Ciprian Ciucu as the new general mayor of Bucharest

Update: After the counting of the almost 590,000 votes cast in Bucharest, Liberal (PNL) candidate Ciprian Ciucu won the elections for general mayor with 36.1% (over 211,000 votes), holding a lead of more than 14 percentage points over the runner-up. Anca Alexandrescu (21.94%), the candidate backed by the isolationist AUR party, delivered a major surprise by managing to overtake Daniel Băluță (20.51%), the Social Democrat (PSD) candidate.

Initial story: The exit polls published on Sunday, December 7, at 9 PM, give Ciprian Ciucu as the winner of the elections for Bucharest's new general mayor.

The candidate backed by the center-right National Liberal Party won 32.7% of the votes, over 6% ahead of Daniel Băluță, who was backed by PNL’s coalition partner, the Social Democratic Party. Ciucu is the mayor of Bucharest’s District 6, while Băluță leads the District 4 City Hall.

Overall, the ranking based on the Curs-Avangarde exit poll is as follows: Ciprian Ciucu (32.7%), Daniel Băluță (26.3%), Anca Alexandrescu, the candidate backed by far-right party Alliance for the Union of Romanians (20.2%), Cătălin Drulă, supported by the reformist Union Save Romania party (12.8%), and Ana Ciceală with 6%

Exit polls do not give the final results of the elections. The percentages are compiled based on the answers that people leaving the polling stations give to authorized pollsters.

Commenting on the exit polls, Daniel Băluță thanked Bucharest residents for their turnout and called for “maximum attention” in the polling stations during the counting of the ballots. He stated that the result is “inconclusive” until the counting process is completed.

Ciprian Ciucu, the winner of the elections according to the exit polls, also thanked those who voted. “I want to send a message of unity for the parties in the governing coalition, especially for those in the center-right. We will have a lot of work at the PMB, and we will have many projects to pass. I want to make Bucharest the project of my life, and not in the short term, but in the long term,” Ciucu said, cited by Digi24.

Ciucu also thanked the leader of the National Liberal Party, prime minister Ilie Bolojan, for his support. “I wanted to be the mayor of Bucharest. It is good that I started as a sector mayor because I feel much better prepared than 5–6 years ago. I am living the dream of my life, and I thank the Bucharest residents very, very much for having trusted me and voted for me,” he concluded.