‘What is specific for the voting process abroad is that it spans a longer interval than voting in the homeland. This means that the actual vote starts at 8:00 p.m. Romanian time in Auckland, New Zealand, where the earliest-opening polling station is located, and closes on Monday, November 23, at 7:00 a.m. Romanian time, when several stations in the U.S., such as Los Angeles, Seattle, San Francisco, Las Vegas, Sacramento, Orange Country and Portland will close,’ director general with the Foreign Ministry’s Public Diplomacy Department Oana Marinescu told a press conference.
The voters can report to the polls within the legally established interval, between 7:00 a.m. and 9:00 p.m. local time. The Foreign Ministry ensured the numbering of the polling stations abroad and saw to the technicalities of the organization process. The Ministry was also responsible for the dispatch of the ballot papers to the Romanian diplomatic missions, which in their turn sent them to the voting stations.
As many as 85 foreign journalists and 57 foreign observers, of whom 29 OSCE observers, requested and received accreditation for the poll. The public diplomacy institutions are responsible for appointing the presidents of the polling stations abroad. Thus, a part of the presidents are appointed from among the staff of the diplomatic missions and 19 staff of the Foreign Ministry’s central office were sent to the voting sections where diplomatic missions could not cover the job themselves.
The list of the polling stations is published on the Ministry’s website at the section dedicated to presidential election and the referendum. The Foreign Ministry organized 294 polling sections all over the world, by an additional 100+ than in the previous elections, when 190 sections were opened for the Romanians outside country boundaries.
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