Romania's High Court rejects again calls for resumption of scrapped presidential elections

Last Friday, April 25, Romania's High Court ICCJ, responding to an objection of the Constitutional Court (CCR), scrapped the unusual ruling issued by the Court of Appeal in Ploiesti, Prahova County (CAP) – which decided on the day earlier that the presidential elections annulled by CCR in 2024 should be resumed with the second ballot.

The ICCJ ruling is final. The presidential rerun will thus be held on May 4, with a second ballot on May 18.

Prahova County Court of Appeal has no jurisdiction over the CCR's decisions, ICCJ explained, without going into the reasons invoked by CAP when scrapping CCR's decision one day earlier, according to RFI.

On April 24, CAP, admitting the request filed by a natural person, Gheorghiţa Popescu, issued a provisory yet enforceable ruling to annul the decision of the CCR to scrap the presidential elections of 2024.

Judge Alexandru Vasile of the CAP has motivated his controversial ruling by the fact that the CCR judges had "abusefully" interpreted the law when they filed the case ex officio, according to a detailed description of the case provided by Europa Libera Romania.

The CAP also invoked the Venice Commission Report, which states that "the power of constitutional courts to invalidate elections ex officio, if any, should be limited to exceptional and clearly regulated circumstances, in order to preserve voters' confidence in their legitimacy."

It also mentioned that the CCR's ruling to scrap the elections occurred after the legal terms for challenging the electoral process and issuing such a decision, furthermore after the second ballot of the elections had already begun in the voting stations outside Romania.

Almost 150 requests to revoke the December 6 ruling by which the CCR annulled last year's election have flooded the courts in Romania in the hope that at least one of them will win – which actually happened on April 24. The campaign was reportedly organized by retired judge Lacramioara Axinte over the TikTok social network, with the help of supporters of far-right politician Calin Georgescu – who won the first round of the presidential elections last year but was banned from running again because of his extremist stance.