The executive board of the opposition centre-right National Liberal Party, PNL, on Monday said Klaus Iohannis would run for the party in the presidential elections in early November.

Iohannis, 55, an ethnic German and mayor of the Transylvanian city of Sibiu, won an internal competition against former party leader Crin Antonescu, and promised to be a “visionary and moderate President.

“We have to stay united and to regain the voters’ confidence and in the end I am sure I can win a future presidential election,” Iohannis said.

Iohannis still has some challenges to face, as the PNL is to merge this month with another center-right party, the Democratic Liberal Party, PDL.

A consensus candidate of the centre-right is to be nominated for the next presidential elections in early August. The PDL is supporting its own candidate, but Iohannis is seen as the favourite.

The presidential elections on November 2 are important for Romania because the President has to right to nominate the Prime Minister, the chiefs of intelligence services and the heads of anti-corruption bodies.

The current centre-left ruling coalition is confident it will win the election, judging by its performance in the European parliamentary elections in May, when it won around 38 per cent of the votes.

The governing alliance is comprised of the Social Democratic Party, PSD, and two minor parties. They have also a clear majority in parliament.

The Prime Minister, Victor Ponta, is to be the ruling party’s candidate for next presidential elections in Romania, and is tipped to win the November vote.

A recent poll suggested that Ponta would get 46.3 per cent of the votes in the first round of the next presidential elections, while Iohannis, would come second with 32.6 per cent.

The vote would then go to a second round run-off in which Ponta would likely get 55 per cent of the votes and Iohannis 45 per cent, the survey conducted by the Political Rating Agency pollster suggested.