Residents of 26 cantons of the country participated in the referendum. 60% of the population voted for extending the agreement, 40% against.
The question of holding a nationwide referendum arose after the right-wing Swiss People's Party expressed doubt about the need to extend the agreement with the EU, citing fears that an influx of Eastern European residents would provoke a rise in crime and increase unemployment in Switzerland.
In turn, supporters of extending the agreement warned that in case of refusal, Switzerland would be isolated from the rest of the EU countries, and pointed to the positive effect that the influx of skilled labor from Eastern European countries would have on the state's economy.
The results of the referendum put at stake Switzerland's relations not only with Romania and Bulgaria, but with all other EU members. The fact is that since 1992, when a nationwide referendum rejected Switzerland's accession to the EU, the policy of rapprochement with the European Union has been regulated by a series of bilateral agreements with each EU member state. As Deutsche Welle notes, the most notable feature of this model is the so-called 'guillotine clause,' the essence of which is that the cancellation of agreements with one EU member state automatically terminates the treaty with all the others.
Thus, the Swiss refusal to grant citizens of Bulgaria and Romania the right to free movement would have led to the restoration of borders between Switzerland and the other EU member states, which had been abolished just a few months earlier.