Romanian Presidential Election First Round 1st Place
"TikTok Viral Success... Gathering Uncounted Support Rates"
Video of Riding a White Horse Gains Attention
Independent candidate Colin Georgescu, who took first place in the first round of the Romanian presidential election. Photo by Yonhap News
An independent candidate in the Romanian presidential election caused a surprise by taking first place through a strategy that actively utilized social networking services (SNS).
On the 25th (local time), the British daily Financial Times (FT) analyzed the support rate of far-right candidate C?lin Georgescu (62) in an article titled "How a Pro-Putin TikTok Star Took First Place in the Romanian Presidential Election." Previously, Georgescu caused a sensation by ranking first with 22.95% of the vote in the first round of the presidential election held the day before.
In the Romanian presidential election, if no candidate receives a majority of the votes, a runoff is held between the top two candidates. Georgescu's advance was considered the biggest upset in Romanian election history. As an independent, he was one of the "other" candidates with only 0.4% support in a poll conducted last month. Another poll conducted this month showed a significant rise to 5.4%, but he still ranked sixth. However, in the actual vote, he recorded over 20% support, causing a major upset. He will face Elena Lasconi, leader of the center-right opposition party Romanian Save Union (USR), in the runoff scheduled for the 8th of next month.
FT pointed out that Georgescu gathered uncounted support in polls by going viral on TikTok. Without a party affiliation, he campaigned by posting his own videos on TikTok, which recently gained attention and saw a rapid increase in views. Videos of Georgescu emphasizing the importance of sports, such as riding a white horse or practicing judo himself, surpassed 220,000 views and gained popularity. Especially, a video in which he stated in an interview, "We must solve domestic issues first instead of supporting Ukraine," opposing aid, recorded the highest views on his account with 4.7 million views.
Ion Ionita, a Romanian analyst and historian, told FT, "His success is a victory for TikTok," adding, "No party is necessary; as long as you go viral on SNS, that’s enough. He definitely went viral." He also mentioned that Romania's mainstream parties have lost public trust due to various scandals and economic issues, adding, "Voters do not pay attention to messages that have nothing to do with reality."
Meanwhile, Romanian election authorities reportedly instructed Georgescu last week to delete some TikTok videos that lacked election advertising labels. Those videos were subsequently removed from his official TikTok account, but fans continue to share them.
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