EUROPARLIAMENTARY ELECTION: EVERYONE HAS WON AND

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 03 BUCHAREST 001318

SIPDIS

SIPDIS

STATE FOR EUR/NCE

E.O. 12958: DECL: 11/28/2017
TAGS: PREL PGOV RO
SUBJECT: EUROPARLIAMENTARY ELECTION: EVERYONE HAS WON AND
ALL MUST GET PRIZES

REF: BUCHAREST 1304

Classified By: Polcouns Theodore Tanoue for Reasons 1.4 (b) and (d)


1. (C) Summary: In the aftermath of the November 25 Euro
Parliamentary election and referendum, all major parties have
tried to publicly spin the results as a victory for their
side. PNL contacts said the key lesson from the election was
for them: "Don't fight with Basescu." Since his opponents
had avoided a head-to-head confrontation, Basescu had been
reduced to shadow-boxing during the entire campaign, hence
the low referendum turnout. Senior PSD contacts also evinced
satisfaction, noting that the referendum showed that Basescu
was not invincible. PSD legislator Hrebenciuc said there was
80 percent chance for the creation of a new cabinet within
the next 10 days. PLD co-founder Stoica downplayed Basescu's
role in his party's strong performance, and said that the
PLD's new strategy was to establish itself as "the other
Liberal party" in order to draw defectors from the PNL when
the Tariceanu government finally fell. A senior Presidential
Office advisor told us the election sent a mixed message--the
good news for the President was that the election confirmed
both the PD's new status as the preeminent party in Romania
and the absolute decline in support for the PSD; the bad news
was that the President's opponents in the PSD, PNL, and UDMR
still outnumbered the PD and PLD combined. End Summary.


2. (C) Education Minister (PNL) Cristian Adomnitei told
Polcouns 11/27 that while nearly all parties could
justifiably claim some measure of victory from Sunday's EP
elections, the "real losers" were President Basescu, Vadim
Tudor, and Gigi Becali. Basescu's game plan had been to
insert himself into the election campaign through the
referendum. What Basescu didn't reckon with, said Adomnitei,
was that the PNL had learned to counter Basescu's game. The
lesson was: "Don't fight Basescu." Adomnitei said that the
PNL's strategy of ignoring Basescu had paid off; without an
opponent to spar with, Basescu's campaign became mere shadow
boxing. Adomnitei acknowledged that Basescu remained a
formidable asset to the PD. In rural districts where the PNL
fought for every vote, the PD managed to easily win a 25
percent vote share even in places with no visible PD
organization, simply because many rural voters saw it as "the
king's party." He argued, however, that the failure of Gigi
Becali's PNG and the poor referendum turnout signaled a sea
change in Romanian politics: voters were tiring of Basescu's
aggressive and divisive tactics and were looking for more
"serious and constructive" leaders.


3. (C) PSD contacts similarly evinced satisfaction with the
election results. PSD eminence grise Viorel Hrebenciuc told
Polcouns 11/28 that the referendum demonstrated that
President Basescu was "not invincible." Hrebenciuc also
claimed credit for the PRM meltdown, boasting that "I
invented Becali" knowing that the PNG would eventually "kill
off" Vadim Tudor's PRM. He predicted "an 80 percent chance
for the creation of a new government within 10 days". Asked
whether the PSD would pressure the PNL by threatening another
no-confidence vote, he insisted that any PNL-PSD coalition
would be by "mutual agreement" only. When Polcouns noted
that, in absolute terms, the center-right components of the
old D-A alliance had won a majority of votes cast, Hrebenciuc
agreed, but insisted that in Romanian politics, personalities
and personality clashes always trumped ideology. Asked
whether Geoana wanted a cabinet seat, Hrebenciuc responded,
"he's saying no today because he wants to stay chief of the
PSD..." Hrebenciuc dismissed rumors of a putsch against
Geoana, arguing that Iliescu, Nastase, and Vacaroiu's
influence was down to "nothing these days" and noting that
younger Geoana rivals Diaconescu and Ponta were "not ready
yet." Hrebenciuc also confirmed that coalition negotiations
also included discussions on postponing legislative elections
until March 2009.


4. (C) At an 11/28 briefing for NATO/EU embassies, PSD
President Geoana asserted that Basescu had won the referendum
in May, but had lost the next round "so the score is now tied
1 to 1". Geoana predicted a 50 percent chance for "business
as usual" and (referring to ongoing PSD-PNL negotiations over
forming a coalition cabinet) another 50 percent chance that
the PSD would take a "strategic decision" to "change things"
next week. Geoana said that he had "ruled out" the
possibility of a rapprochement with Basescu's PD, saying that
this was a "last resort" given the strong preferences of the
PSD voter base. Geoana also claimed that the election had
exposed new fissures between Basescu and the PD, as the
President had thrown his support to the PLD, which was now
his "new favorite" party. Interestingly, during a long
digression on foreign policy issues, Geoana in response to a
query from an EU Ambassador stated that Romania would not

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withdraw from its Alliance commitments in Afghanistan and the
western Balkans, but was already "phasing out naturally" from
Iraq. Geoana said that it was the PSD's decision to commit
troops to Iraq in the first place, and his party therefore
could not say "flat out" that Romanian troops were leaving,
but concluded "I will scale down Iraq, and I will do it
relatively fast, but in consultations with our friends."


5. (C) PLD co-founder Valeriu Stoica evinced satisfaction
with the election results, noting that no other new political
party had succeeding in breaking the 5 percent electoral
threshold since 1992. Asked about the role that President
Basescu played in the PLD's success, Stoica responded, "he
was great for one hour of one day" during a joint campaign
rally in Iasi, but insisted the PLD got there on its own
steam. He added that one of the factors in the PLD's success
was that it emphasized its autonomy and didn't campaign as
"Basescu's party." Stoica added that he was pleased that in
some urban districts, the PLD managed to out-poll the PNL.
Stoica told Polcouns that there had been a fundamental
rethinking of the PNL's strategy in the months leading up to
the EP race; up to now, it was the PLD that had been wooing
the PD to form a tight alliance leading to a single party.
He said the strategy now was to position the PLD as "the
other Liberal party" so that when the Tariceanu government
finally falls, PNL members would more readily abandon the PNL
to the PLD. Stoica said the model for PLD-PD relations would
be the same inter-party protocol signed between the PD-PNL in
the previous D-A alliance.


6. (C) Stoica said that Basescu's referendum play had been
"a mistake", noting that Basescu should have focused first on
amending the referendum law (to eliminate the 50 percent plus
one threshold for a "valid" referendum.) before calling the
referendum, as it was clear from the outset that there was no
way that Basescu would manage to obtain a turnout of over 50
percent of registered voters. A second mistake was in trying
to run a campaign on an "abstract" issue such as electoral
reform. The previous referendum (in May 2007) had drawn
voters' attention because it was a personal battle between
Basescu and the 322 legislators who had suspended the
President. Stoica concluded that Basescu's "referendum" card
was now "degraded" and that the President would be loath to
play that card again. Basescu would have to "be very
careful" he concluded. Stoica acknowledged that with the
exception of the right-extremist parties, all major parties
could rightfully boast that they had done well in the
election, but noted that "the battle has just started" in a
grueling series of four elections. He concluded that "if
you're happy with the result yesterday, you'll be a loser two
years down the line..."


7. (C) Presidential Office Senior Advisor Cristian Preda was
relatively somber regarding the election result, noting that
there were two--somewhat conflicting--lessons to be drawn
from the election and referendum. The first lesson was good
news for the PD, as the election confirmed the PD's new
status as Romania's preeminent party, and the absolute
decline in support for the left to around 22 percent of the
electorate. The second lesson, he said, was less welcome, as
the election results showed that any PSD/PNL/UDMR formation
still received more votes than the PD and PLD combined.
Preda noted, however, that while a more formal PSD/PNL/UDMR
alliance was the "rational scenario", Romania was by no
stretch a "rational country" and existing
divisions--especially within the PSD--still gave room to
maneuver for Basescu's side. Preda was blunt in describing
the referendum as a failure, adding that it underscored that
referenda could not be used as an "instrument of governance"
at least until the referendum law as revised.


8. (C) PD Vice President Romeo Raicu was similarly downbeat
regarding the referendum, remarking that the PD would likely
have done better overall in the EP contest had there been no
referendum. Raicu was openly bitter about the PLD's strong
performance, accusing the PLD of stealing votes from the PD
and likening the PLD to "the bird that sits on the
crocodile's back." He said that in the days leading up to
the failed no-confidence vote October 3, the PD had offered
to go into coalition with the PSD, including a fifty-fifty
split of cabinet seats. Raicu confirmed, however, that the
PD had not renewed its offer despite the ongoing PSD-PLD
negotiations over forming a coalition. Rather, he said, the
PD would be to go on the "attack" by going into "deep
opposition" to the incumbent government in coming weeks.


9. (C) Comment: Sunday's vote continues to resonate, but the
relatively good showing of both the PNL and PSD are likely to
militate against any abrupt senior leadership changes in
either party. The fact that both these parties surpassed

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(relatively modest) expectations, however, is also likely to
make for hard bargaining between the two sides in any
discussions on forming a coalition government, as the
election gave neither side a whip hand. There is agreement
that the election was somewhat of a failure on Basescu's
part. We were somewhat surprised at the blunt admission from
at least one senior Presidential Advisor that this was the
case, and that Basescu was unlikely to try to resort to the
referendum card so readily in the future. Many contacts
stress, however, that Sunday's EP election should not be seen
as a definitive test of the relative strengths of each party,
as many parties are carefully husbanding resources for the
four back-to-back elections scheduled to take place between
now and the end of 2009. End Comment.
TAUBMAN