The political battle for Bucharest City Hall, as reflected in TV talk-shows

Four TV shows related to the upcoming local elections, which were analyzed by HotNews.ro based on the information received from Monitoring Media reveal that Bucharest independent candidate Sorin Oprescu loves to talk about himself a lot. Thus, he is most favored by the TV talk show format of Realitatea TV while National TV is more suitable for those candidates who are ready to engage in problem-solving issues for Bucharest, like Social Democrat (PSD) Cristian Diaconescu and Democrat Liberal (PD-L) Vasile Blaga.

HotNews.ro monitored four TV shows at Realitatea TV and National TV between May 2 – 9, 2008 where candidates had the chance to confront each other, in pairs. The main conclusions show that independent Sorin Oprescu likes to brag a lot as he talked about himself about 21 times at each of the three talk shows present. When he confronted his rival Democrat Liberal candidate, Oprescu referred to his person 28 times.

Oprescu is also the candidate who refers least to his electoral platform for Bucharest with just one declaration in a talk show. It seems that he is very persevering, because, when confronting his former Social Democratic colleague, Cristian Diaconescu he did not put forward any political plan or project for Bucharest.

What’s interesting is that Liberal Ludovic Orban expressed his sympathy for his independent counter-candidate. Orban declared that he resembles Oprescu in the sense that they are both independent and have no fear in expressing their stand. Oprescu returned the favor and added that he appreciated Orban for his special behavior in a system that imposes decisions. Would this be the reason for which Orban did not attack Oprescu in any talk show?

However, things change when it comes to Democrat Liberal Vasile and Social Democrat Cristian Diaconescu. The two do not miss the chance to attack their opponents at any time but do it on professional rather than personal grounds. Moreover, both Blaga and Diaconescu seem to talk a lot about the projects they envisage for Bucharest: Blaga registered 31 declarations while Diaconescu 20 such statements.

In terms of political affiliation, all candidates seem to defend their party and party colleagues: Blaga referred, on average about two times at PD-L while Diaconescu three times on average to PSD. Ludovic Orban seems a great defender of the Liberals (PNL) with a 5 times average. On an interesting note, independent Oprescu referred to his former Social Democratic party affiliation four times in a talk show.