Romanian Social Democratic PM Victor Ponta won the first round of the presidential elections on Sunday with 40.33% of the votes, followed by the leading opposition candidate, Klaus Iohannis, with 30.44%, according to official partial results with 98.3% of votes counted by Monday at noon.
Third comes Ponta's Liberal ally Calin Popescu Tariceanu with 5.4% of the votes. Elena Udrea, the rightist candidate supported by incumbent President Traian Basescu, received 5.18%, Monica Macovei - 4.46%, populist candidate Dan Diaconescu - 3.99%, Hungarian Democrat leader Kelemen Hunor - 3.5% and far rightist candidate Vadim Tudor - 3.66%.
Ponta and Iohannis will face off in a second round of elections on November 16.
The poll was marked by bad organisation at polling stations abroad, where hundreds of Romanians could not vote, and by a very high number of votes registered on special ballots (for people out of their home town) in rural-dominated counties with no relevant tourism, industry or education centres.
