EP expects ruling PSD to win 10 of Romania’s 33 seats in May 26 elections

The European Parliament (EP) on February 17 launched the first estimates on its future structure after the elections in May, based on a selection of representative national polls in member countries.

The next European Parliament will have fewer deputies (705) than the current format (751), because of the Brexit. At EU level, the political fragmentation is expected to be higher than in the past, with the European Popular Party holding most seats (183), followed by the Socialists (135 seats).

According to aggregate data, in the May 26th elections, Romania’s senior ruling party, the Social Democratic Party (PSD) will get 10 seats, in line with a 26.5% intended vote, local Hotnews.ro reported. The second largest Romanian party is the National Liberal Party (PNL), with a score of 23% that would bring it 8 MEP seats.

Pro Romania, the party of former Prime Minister Victor Ponta, is third with 9.6% of the intended votes and 3 MEP seats. Victor Ponta's party participates for the first time in elections for the European Parliament. Three seats each would also be assigned to Save Romania Union (USR, 9.2% of the votes) and the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats (ALDE, 9%).

Two mandates would go to the newly-formed party PLUS of former EU Commissioner Dacian Ciolos (6.8%), Popular Movement Party (PMP, a party initially launched by former President Traian Basescu - 5.6%) and the ethnic Hungarians party (UDMR, 5.2%).

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