A group of Romanian deputies submitted a legislative initiative to make voting compulsory for all Romanian citizens who have the right to vote. Those who don’t vote should pay a RON 1,000 (EUR 225) fine, according to the law project which is currently in public debate.

The initiators of the project say that compulsory voting would reduce the risk of fraud in the elections and would make it harder for some political parties to “buy votes” by “bribing voters”.

They also suggest that the ballots should also contain a white box with the phrase “None of the candidates meets the criteria” for people who don’t agree with any of the candidates. If more than 50 percent of voters stamp this box, then new elections should be held.

This initiative comes as the participation in elections held in Romania decreased significantly in recent years. For example, in the 2012 parliamentary elections, only 41.8 percent of Romanians with voting rights went to the polls. That’s 7.4 million people out of more than 17.7 people registered on the lists.

If the more than 10 million people who didn’t vote in 2012 were to be fined RON 1,000 each, the state would gather more than RON 10 billion, (EUR 2.27 billion), Romania-Insider.com has calculated.

In the elections for the European Parliament in May this year, only a third of the Romanians who are registered on the electoral lists went to vote. In November this year Romanians will be called to the urns again to vote for a new president.

In the European Union, voting is compulsory in Cyprus, Greece, Luxembourg and Belgium and people who don’t vote in these countries are sanctioned. Voting is also compulsory in Italy and Portugal, but no sanctions are applied in these countries.

Andrei Chirileasa, andrei@romania-insider.com