Last attempt at forming a government in the 47th National Assembly: Bulgarian President Rumen Radev presented the mandate to the Bulgarian Socialist Party

Last attempt at forming a government in the 47th National Assembly - today at 5pm, President Rumen Radev presented the third mandate to the chairperson of the parliamentary group of the Bulgarian Socialist Party (BSP), Georgi Svilenski.

According to the leader of BSP, Kornelia Ninova, the candidate for the position of Prime Minister should be from “We Continue the Change”, which has the biggest parliamentary group.

The President Rumen Radev presented the third mandate for forming a government to the chairman of the party, Georgi Svilenski.

BSP will begin consultations about forming a cabinet as early as tomorrow. They will count on the partners from the previous quadruple coalition from the beginning of this parliament.

“The first thing that we are going to do is to put on the table the programme, created by the three parties.The reason is that it is the uniting thing between the three parties, but it is also an opportunity to renew our relations with our parliamentary partners up until now. We hold the opinion that the largest party should declare their candidate for Prime Minister,” said the leader of BSP, Kornelia Ninova.

Though no particular names have been discussed, BSP intends to keep the four ministers who participate in the current government.

“The Executive Board of the party confirmed the four current ministers and valued their work highly. We think that there should be clear political responsibility. Our request was for Kiril Petkov not to be the Prime Minister. Stepping back, he understood that and deserves respect,” added Kornelia Ninova.

BSP will not seek support from GERB-UDF, the Movement for Right and Freedom (MRF) and “Vazrazhdane”, and, commenting on the disagreements on the topic of Russia with their previous partners, Ninova reminded that an agreement was reached in the programme for the first mandate, around which BSP united with “We Continue the Change” and “Democratic Bulgaria”.

“It is written in the programme that we created that we all unite around the wish for diplomatic efforts to settle the relations with the Russian Federation and to prevent the embassy’s closure,” added Kornelia Ninova.

The first parliamentary group they will seek support from is “We Continue the Change”.