World Notes ROMANIA

With a 94% turnout and 85% of the vote in elections last week, President-elect Ion Iliescu of Romania was almost in the same league as his predecessor, Nicolae Ceausescu, the Communist tyrant who posted similar landslides in pro forma balloting. But this was a free election, complete with opposition candidates and Western observers. That must have made Iliescu's victory all the sweeter, despite opposition allegations of ballot-box fraud, voter intimidation and media monopolization by his incumbent National Salvation Front.

Iliescu's background as a former senior Communist Party official failed to outweigh the personal popularity he has won since the Front came to power last December. Working in his favor were generous food imports, an end to miserly controls over heat and light, and a go-slow approach to economic reform that has so far avoided layoffs and higher prices. The relative obscurity of his opposition rivals and their lack of support among rural and industrial workers also helped. Iliescu has said he will model Romania's economy on that of Sweden, while retaining government control of heavy industry and agriculture. Having shed the corrupt Ceausescu, Romanians seem in less of a hurry to discard communism.