POLITICAL PARTIES’ REACTIONS AFTER THE 25TH MAY EUROPEAN ELECTIONS

Early elections and Parliament to dissolve on Wednesday. 28th May, demanded the leader of the political party GERB, Boyko Borisov, at the press conference after announcement of the provisional results from the elections to the European Parliament held in Bulgaria on 25th May. Based on 97,5% of the vote count, the center-right GERB, which is a member of the European People’s Party (EPP), won 30,47% of the Bulgarian citizen’s vote.

Borisov highlighted the victory of his party over the socialist party led by Sergei Stanishev, the President of the Party of the European Socialists (PES). As a result of GERB’s successful performance, Borisov will propose Maria Nedelcheva or Andrei Kovachev, both current MEPs, for the Deputy President’s post of the European People’s Party in Brussels. According to Borisov it would be fair the leader of the socialist party in Bulgaria and President of PES, Sergei Stanishev to submit resignation.

At the press conference in the elections night, the leader of the Bulgarian Socialist Party and President of PES, Sergei Stanishev, said that the elections for MEPs were difficult and the voter turnout was rather low. Information about the turnout as at midday on 26th May indicated that 19,05% of the eligible voters cast a ballot in favour of the socialists. Stanishev said that the performance of the left wing in the European Elections was dissatisfactory and disappointing. Despite that he stated he had no intention to resign neither as the leader of BSP, nor as the President of PES.

In his opinion, the socialists did not manage to mobilize their supporters and convince them that the European Parliament elections were as important as the general elections in the country. He also rejected the arguments that the results of these elections were directed against the government. Stanishev congratulated GERB for the victory. He considered the victory of extreme nationalists and anti-European forces in a number of EU countries as worrying.

The ‘Movement for Rights and Freedoms’ (MRF) is the only political party which not only obtained the same result as the one from the last year’s parliamentary elections in Bulgaria, but even slightly increased its share of the vote. That is how the leader, Lyutvi Mestan, commented the indisputable success of MRF in the European Elections. MRF is a member of the European political family of the liberals –Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe (ALDE). Based on 97.5% vote count, MRF took 17,14% of the share of the Bulgarian citizens’ vote.

The controversial candidate for MEP, Delyan Peevski, who was second in the MRF list said that despite of being elected, he would not take up his seat as MEP and ceded it to Iskra Mihailova, currently Minister of Environment and Water, from the same political group. The MFR leader stated that his party was not running away from its national responsibilities, but he did not give a specific reply to the question whether his party would continue to support the current cabinet led by the Prime Minister Oresharski or not.

The leader of ‘Bulgaria without Censorship’, Nikolai Barekov urged for early parliamentary elections after his coalition came forth in the polls. Members of his coalition described its performance as a success, especially for a new party which is not represented in the Bulgarian Parliament. The ex TV presenter said that he would take the seat as an MEP, but was ready to cede it. Angel Dzhambazki (party ‘Internal Macedonian Revolutionary Organization’) who is number two in the BWC coalition’s list for the European Parliament elections said that in terms of values, BWC was closest to the conservatives in the UK.

The coalition ‘Reformist Bloc’ calls for the resignation of the government and early elections. According to the provisional results as at 26th May, the right wing formation obtained 6,41% of the votes. In addition, the preferential voting placed Svetoslav Malinov, who was second in the Reformist Bloc’s European Election list, in front of Meglena Kuneva, who was the top candidate in the list. Svetoslav Malinov, a representative of the party ‘Democrats for Strong Bulgaria’ (DSB) was a MEP in the previous European Parliament and was part of the political group of the European People’s Party. The spokesperson of the coalition and chairman of DSB, Radan Kanev described the election results as a defeat for the anti-Europeans and a historical defeat for the Bulgarian socialist Party.

Чуйте последните новини, където и да сте!
Последвайте ни във Facebook и Instagram
Следете и канала на БНТ в YouTube
Вече може да ни гледате и в TikTok
Намерете ни в Google News