TikTok, cyberattack… What is this mess during the first round?

How was Calin Georgescu, a pro-Russian far-right candidate, able to come out on top in the first round of the presidential election in Romania? No one expected him there, just as no one expected the elimination of the Prime Minister. A result suspicious enough for the Romanian Constitutional Court to order a recount of the votes this Thursday.

The court was seized of a request to cancel the vote by Cristian Terhes, a far-right MEP who came in ninth position in Sunday’s vote. He accuses one of the parties of having continued to campaign online after the authorized deadline, believing that this could have favored Elena Lasconi. The latter came in second position, just ahead of Prime Minister Marcel Ciolacu who found himself excluded from the race even though he was the favorite.

“Preferential treatment” from TikTok

The Constitutional Court also rejected another appeal, received “late”, which denounced the opaque financing of the campaign of Calin Georgescu, who unexpectedly came to the top of the first round. This former senior Romanian official, admirer of Russian President Vladimir Putin and opposed to aid to Ukraine, was able to convince with a campaign on TikTok that went viral. On this subject, the presidency also denounces “preferential treatment” of the candidate on the part of the social network which gave him “massive exposure”.

The icing on the cake is that the Romanian presidency claims to have noted “cyberattacks” aimed at “influencing the regularity of the electoral process” in progress. At the end of a meeting of the Supreme Council of National Defense, the authorities noted “a growing interest” on the part of Russia to “influence the Romanian public agenda […] in the current regional security context.