Romanians elect dead mayor

Say what you want about the ever-more-floundering Gordon Brown - i.e. that he's a liability to his party and should step down immediately before further damage is caused, something like that - chances are you wouldn't go as far as to speculate that he'd be beaten in an election by a dead man.

Pity poor Gheorghe Dobrescu, then. All he wanted to be was the mayor of a Romanian village. Such humble dreams have been snatched from his grasp, however ... and it's all thanks to the antics of a cheeky scheming corpse.

Okay, okay ... maybe that was a little unfair. We're not actually implying that Neculai Ivascu - mayor of the town for two decades, and poor chap who unfortunately died of liver disease before voting began in a municipal election - had any dastardly beyond-the-grave hand in events. Unless he was really politically motivated.

No. The decision to let Ivascu retain his position (despite the disadvantage of not being alive) is all down to the will of the villagers. One of them justified his vote to local television by stating the following: