​The main alliance of Romanian opposition parties, the Right Romania Alliance (ARD), was dismantled a day after parliamentary elections in which it suffered an overwhelming defeat against the governing Social Liberal Union (USL). While partial results show USL with about 60% of the total number of votes, USL says its own parallel counting shows it won with about 66% of MP seats. Meanwhile, The elections were harsh for the ARD leaders who have yet to learn if they'll get a seat in the Parliament - which will have more MPs than available room on the parliamentary floor.

The Right Romania Alliance (ARD), formed of the Democratic Liberal Party (PDL), the Peasants Party (PNTCD) and the Civic Force was dismantled on Monday, as it served as an electoral alliance, but its leaders say the framework protocol to unify the Romanian right would continue.

The news comes as ARD suffered a harsh defeat in the Sunday general elections, with partial results showing it had drawn considerably less than 20% of the votes. And the co-presidents of ARD and other prominent ARD figures were still waiting on Monday to learn if they'd get a place in the parliament with the redistribution of votes, as they figured second or even third in terms of number of votes in their constituencies.

The latest partial results announced at 6 p.m. on Monday showed the governing USL alliance scoring a major win with about 60% of the votes, followed by ARD with around 16%, the populist PPDD party third with about 14% and the Hungarian Democrats (UDMR) fourth with slightly above the 5% threshold needed to enter Parliament.

Meanwhile, USL announced its own parallel counting showed the union received about 66% of MP seats, followed by PDL with 15%, PPDD with 11.5% and UDMR with 5.1%. USL is formed of Social Democrats (PSD), the National Liberal Party (PNL)-Conservative Party (PC) and the UNPR group. According to USL counting, PSD would be represented by 192 MPs - PNL - 141, PC - 19 and UNPR - 12.

The counting would mean the new Parliament will have 550 members, 80 more than the current legislature, so that there would not be enough room on the parliament floor for all newly elected MPs. That comes despite Romanians voted in a referendum in 2007 for a Parliament formed of only 300 members.

Results of note:

  • Serving prime minister and PSD leader Victor Ponta obtained some 60% of the total votes in his constituency, double the number of votes received by his main rival - Dan Diaconescu, leader of the populist PPDD party, according to partial results quoted by news agency Mediafax.
  • Sebastian Ghita, owner of USL-friendly news channel Romania TV and a candidate for USL, scored about 70% of votes in his constituency.
  • The former secretary of top PSD official Liviu Dragnea, Elena Catalina Stefanescu, was elected deputy with a better score than Dragnea himself, according to Realitatea.net. Both candidates ran in the same county of Teleorman, which scored the highest turnout in the elections - about 55%.
  • The first top leader of the PDL and ARD to resign following the election was Cezar Preda. He resigned as first vice-president of PDL and of head of the PDL branch in Buzau county, according to a press release.
  • Another PDL leader, Cristian Preda, wrote on his blog on Monday that ARD lost more than it expected and that one explanation was related to differences within PDL, "which made it so a part of mayors elected in June [local elections] did not support candidates in December [general elections]".