Romania is investigating the role of TikTok in the victory of pro-Russian candidate Georgescu in the first round of the presidential election

Romanian authorities are trying to find out what role the Chinese social network TikTok may have played in the emotional results of the first round of the country’s presidential elections over the weekend. Unexpectedly for everyone, the first place was taken by the far-right independent politician Calin Georgescu, who is accused of having ties to the Kremlin.

On Thursday, Romania’s Supreme National Defense Council will hold an emergency meeting to discuss the potential dangers of social media and popular internet platforms to the electoral process and the country as a whole.

According to a statement from the office of current Romanian President Klaus Iohannis, who heads the council, the meeting will be sent to analyze “potential threats to national security caused by the actions of state cyber players and non-state. “

Georgescu, 62, was almost unknown outside Romania. Until recently, he was not considered a major presidential candidate and conducted his election campaign mainly on the Internet, on the TikTok platform.

Nevertheless, in the first round, which was unexpected for everyone, he managed take first placereceiving support from around 23% of voters and eliminating five competitors, including Prime Minister Marcel Ciolaka.

In the second round, which is scheduled for December 8, he will face Elena Lasconi, who heads the center-right liberal party Union for the Liberation of Romania. (In the first round she got about 19% of the votes).

Two of the candidates who were eliminated in the first round have challenged the election results in the Romanian High Court. They want voting decisions to be suspended because Georgescu failed to disclose the sources of funding for his election campaign.

Georgescu’s own campaign headquarters has yet to comment on this statement.

It is known that Georgescu received a large part of his votes from young voters and Romanian citizens living abroad, and that he campaigned mostly online, especially on the TikTok platform .

On Tuesday, Romania’s National Audiovisual Council called on the European Commission to investigate the role of TikTok in the result of the vote due to “suspicions of manipulation of public opinion.” “

As the vice-president of the audio-visual council, Valentin-Alexander Yukan, said on the eve of Thursday’s meeting, according to his information, the platform’s algorithms were more helpful in distributing material that was favorable your particular candidate. At the same time, according to him, it was not clear who paid for this election campaign and how.

On Wednesday night, the head of the Romanian regulator ANCOM said that although he will investigate possible election manipulation, he will request a temporary ban on TikTok in the country.

Parliamentary elections are scheduled to take place in Romania on December 1.

TikTok’s management rejected Bucharest’s accusations against them.

“Reports about the Romanian elections are not enough accurate and false, because most candidates have accounts on TikTok, and the winners also campaigned on other digital platforms, not just us,” said representatives of the social network.

At the same time, the European Commission confirmed that Bucharest’s request to open an investigation was received, but so far it is only “closely monitoring developments.”

“If, based on the evidence we have, the Commission suspects that violations have occurred,” he said in a message sent to reporters on the matter, “it may initiate proceedings to verify that TikTok complying with the rules”.

On Tuesday night, after the election results were announced, large protests were held in major Romanian cities with slogans such as “No to Putin, no fear,” “Europe is our mother,” and “Youth asking you not to vote. for a dictator.”

Before the election, Georgescu called Romania’s fascist politicians of martyrs and national heroes of the 1930s, criticizing NATO and the Romanian government’s support for Ukraine, saying that Bucharest should cooperate with Moscow rather than challenge it.

He also denied the existence of Covid and said that Romania could benefit from “Russian wisdom.”

In 2018, Georgescu called Russian President Vladimir Putin one of the few politicians in the world who are “real leaders.”

The victory of this candidate in the first round was clearly welcomed by the Russian state media, including Sputnik, RT and RIA Novosti.

“He became a product of the wilderness [в румынской политике] and, perhaps, Russian money, – said Politico Milan Nitsch of the German Council on Foreign Relations think tank. “If you can suddenly spend that much money on TikTok, it raises questions. “

Georgescu himself rejects accusations that he is protecting the Kremlin and that he intends to turn Romania in the opposite direction from the West.

On Tuesday night he posted the following message on his Facebook page: “I don’t want to leave NATO, I don’t want to leave the European Union. What I want is to stand, not to kneel, not to take everything for granted. As I said, we have to do whatever is in our national interest.”

Georgescu also appeared on the BBC Newshour program and categorically rejected suggestions that he was receiving support from Moscow.

He said that “the budget of this campaign was zero” because all the work was done by volunteers – “ten people at the most, no more, but we had millions of people behind us . ” Georgescu assured that “the only help [которую он получал] it was from God.”

According to Georgescu, there is now a “big shift” in Romanian politics, led by the voters losing trust in the main political parties.

He compared his victory to that of Donald Trump in the US election in November, blaming the Romanian national media for not being considered a major candidate.

“This is not the first time they have made this mistake,” he said. “All the polls were fake, but we could show that when the Romanian people really fight for freedom and democracy, they can show an iron will.”