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Incumbent President Klaus Iohannis is leading by a wide margin in the first round of the presidential election with 37.49 pct, followed by Social Democrat candidate Viorica Dancila - 22.69 pct, and candidate of the USR PLUS Alliance Dan Barna, with 14.73 pct, spokesman for the Central Electoral Bureau (BEC) Mircea Preotescu said on Monday, after the results from 19,407 polling stations of the total of 19,586 (99.09 percent) have been centralised.
Preotescu said that data from all the polling places in the country have been centralized and data from only 179 foreign stations still have to be processed.
According to the BBEC spokesman, Iohannis garnered 3,381,848 votes in the first round (37.49 pct), Dancila - 2,047,141 (22.69 pct), and Barna - 1,329,161 (14.73 pct).
They are trailed by the rest of the presidential contenders as follows: Mircea Diaconu ('UN OM' Alliance) - 8.96 pct (808,380 votes); Theodor Paleologu (People's Movement Party) - 5.70 pct (514,607 votes); Kelemen Hunor (Hungarian Democratic Union of Romania) - 3.95 pct (356,199 votes); Ramona-Ioana Bruynseels (Humanist Power Party) - 2.67 pct (240,896 votes); Alexandru Cumpanasu (independent) - 1.51 pct (136,654 votes); Viorel Catarama (Liberal Right) - 0.53 pct (48,039 votes); Bogdan Stanoevici (independent) - 0.42 pct (38,332 votes); Catalin Ivan (Alternative for National Dignity) - 0.36 pct (32,388 votes); Ninel Peia (Romanian Nation Party) - 0.33 pct (30,211 votes); Sebastian Popescu (New Romania Party) - 0.33 pct (30,024 votes); John-Ion Banu (Romanian Nation Party) - 0.30 pct (27,190 votes).
The voter turnout was 9,163,044, representing 50.11 pct of the total number of voters registered with the permanent rolls.
The number of valid ballots cast is 9,021,070, accounting for 98.45 pct of the total number of votes. The total number of null votes is 139,901 (1.53 pct).
