Romania’s Constitutional Court, CCR, is to decide on May 21 whether the President has the right to get engaged in the European election campaign, following government complaints about the issue.

The government on May 7 sent a note to the court complaining that President Traian Basescu “repeteadly at some public events voiced support for a certain political party … saying he will vote for it and also popularizing the electoral insignia of the political group.”

In recent days, Basescu has openly said that he supports the centre-right People’s Movement Party, PMP, in the European elections scheduled for May 25. The President also posted photographs of himself in a T-shirt with the PMP electoral insignia.

“I deny that my actions are against the constitution. In my opinion, the President is sustained by a political party and remains in contact with that party to promote its program,” Basescu said in an interview in response to the criticism.

The PMP is a recently formed political party, which split from the former ruling Democratic Liberal Party, PDL. Basescu was the PDL leader before becoming President of the country.

The head of the Constitutional Court, Augustin Zegrean, on Wednesday said that the CCR would address the government’s complaints “as quickly as the law allows”.

The centre-left government and President have a long history of disputes, which culminated in a referendum on the impeachment of Basescu last July.

With three weeks to go before European elections in Romania, none of the political forces involved appear to see the elections as a way to discuss key European issues but rather as a test run for the presidential election, to be held later this year.

Analysts say the lack of a clear agenda on the part of most candidates, as well as a perception of clientism and corruption, is likely to contribute to a lack of interest by voters.

European elections have been marked by a high degree of absenteeism in Romania. Only 27 per cent of Romanians voted in the European elections of 2009, compared to a European average of 43 per cent.