A series of media organisations in Romania have abused the lack of clear provisions in the Romanian electoral legislation and published interim results of exit polls on their websites during the Sunday presidential elections, Romanian NGO the Pro Democratia Association and other NGOs warn in an address to the Central Electroal Office.
The NGOs says the partial exit polls issued regularly throughout the day were posted on sites such as antena3.ro, evz.ro, gandul.info, mediafax.ro, realitatea.net and ziare.com.
Partial exit polls have been regularly posted only for the last several elections in Romania, where legislation bans the publication of such data throughout the polling day, but does not provide any regulation on how such practices should be sanctioned - with the exception of TV stations - or what happens when they are posted online.
TV station Realitatea TV was sanctioned by the National Audiovisual Council in the first round of the presidential poll two weeks ago for urging viewers to visit the website of the news station to consult the preliminary exit poll data there. The websites usually use phrases such as "the price of tomatoes" (red is the color of the Social Democrats) or "the price of oranges" (orange is the color of the Liberal Democrats) to reflect percentages candidates are set to receive according to various exit polls. A series of media organisations in Romania have abused the lack of clear provisions in the Romanian electoral legislation and published interim results of exit polls on their websites during the Sunday presidential elections, Romanian NGO the Pro Democratia Association and other NGOs warn in an address to the Central Electroal Office.
The NGOs says the partial exit polls issued regularly throughout the day were posted on sites such as antena3.ro, evz.ro, gandul.info, mediafax.ro, realitate
