Constitutional Court rules that 16 MPs were unlawfully elected "Velichie" party enters Parliament (updated)

The Constitutional Court on March 13 published its decision on the case challenging the election results.

With its ruling, the Constitutional Court declared that 16 Members of Parliament were unlawfully elected:

1. Esheref Esheref, Alliance for Rights and Freedoms
2. Svetoslav Todorov, Vazrazhdane
3. Ivaylo Mitkovski, We Continue the Change-Democratic Bulgaria
4. Dejan Petkov, MECh (Morality, Unity, Hounour)
5. Andrey Valchev, Bulgarian Socialist Party-United Left
6. Rosen Ivanov, MECh
7. Pavlin Yotov, GERB-UDF
8. Emil Trifonov, There is Such a People
9. Stanislav Anastasov, MRF-New Beginning
10. Borislav Petkov, MECh
11. Alexander Nenkov, GERB-UDF
12. Ivan Kyuchukov, There is Such a People
13. Viktor Papazov, Vazrazhdane
14. Metin Kachan, MRF-New Beginning
15. Temenuzhka Petkova, GERB-UDF (and Nikola Dzhambazov, GERB-UDF, in her place)
16. Alexander Markov, There is Such a People

After the recalculation of the results, the 4% electoral threshold for the allocation of seats equals 97,390 valid votes cast in Bulgaria and abroad.

"Velichie" party secured 97,497 votes.

The party that lost the most votes was MRF-New Beginning, with a decrease of 1,110 votes, according to the Constitutional Court’s decision. GERB-UDF lost 452 votes, Vazrazhdane lost 108, and BSP-United Left lost 42.

There is Such a People gained 31 additional votes, MECh gained 28, WCC-DB gained 11 votes, and ARF gained 1 vote.

In November last year, the Constitutional Court allowed for the examination of five cases, all involving challenges to the legality of the elections held on October 27 for the 51st Parliament in 52 polling stations. The court consolidated these five cases for joint review.

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A scandal broke out after the President of the Constitutional Court, Pavlina Panova, announced in a statement on BNT that there was an attempt to sabotage the case regarding the legality of the vote.

The Central Election Commission (CEC) has already provided the Constitutional Court with the final data from the re-calculation of the election results. This happened after a sitting of the CEC yesterday, March 12, when the new deadline given to "Information Services" for this expired.

A day before that, the CEC and Information Service managements were heard at an extraordinary session of parliament. In the plenary it became clear that 780 votes from 7 polling stations had disappeared after the inspection of the experts of the Constitutional Court. It also became clear that the head of "Information Service" Ivaylo Filippov personally filed a report to the prosecutor's office because of the missing votes. This was followed by a request from the prosecutor's office to the CC to provide documents on the election case, but the court refused to give the materials on the grounds that the constitutional case was not closed.

The day before, the leaderships of the CEC and "Information Services" were heard at an extraordinary parliamentary sitting. It became clear in the plenary chamber that 780 ballots from 7 polling stations were missing after the expert check by the Constitutional Court. It was also revealed that the head of "Information Services", Ivaylo Filipov, personally filed a report in the Prosecutor’s Office about the missing votes. Subsequently, the Prosecutor’s Office requested that the Constitutional Court provide documents related to the election case, but the court refused to release the materials, stating that the constitutional case was still ongoing.

• CEC decided to send to Constitutional Court the data from "Information Services" regrading the elections