What Support Do Iliana Iotova and Andrey Gyurov Have Ahead of Sunday’s Presidential Election Run-off?

What level of support do Iliana Iotova and Andrey Gyurov have heading into Sunday’s run-off, and how is that support distributed across the country?

Iliana Yotova heads into the run-off as the leader in terms of votes, but with a lead of only around 42,000 votes over Andrey Gyurov. What does the map of Bulgaria look like after the first round? The Iotova–Valchev ticket won in 27 of the country’s 31 electoral districts. In the remaining four, Gyurov–Kandev received more votes.

Iotova’s strongest support came in Haskovo, where she received almost 48% of the vote, compared with just over 18.6% for Gyurov. That represents a difference of around 12,000 votes.

Iotova also won in Smolyan, with almost 48% against 20% for Gyurov.

The picture was similar in Silistra, where Iotova led Gyurov by around 5,500 votes.

Iotova received 44% of the vote in Razgrad, while Gyurov took almost 23%.

Andrey Gyurov won in all three Sofia electoral districts. In District 23, he received more than 52,000 votes more than Iliana Iotova. In Electoral District 24, Gyurov won almost half of the vote, while Iotova received 23%. The gap between the two in District 25 was around 10,000 votes.

The fourth district where Gyurov came first was Plovdiv-city, where he led Iliana Iotova by seven percentage points.

And what are the two candidates’ chances? Pollsters offer their assessments.

Ahead of the run-off, the candidates’ chances are evenly matched.

Parvan Simeonov – Myara polling agency: “Psychologically, the momentum seems to be working in Gyurov’s favour. Iotova, however, appears to have considerably more room to mobilise additional support.”

Boryana Dimitrova – Alpha Research polling agency: “The situation between the first and second rounds may be different.”

What has happened to support for Progressive Bulgaria in recent months?

Parvan Simeonov – Myara polling agency: “Support stood at 37–38–39, even 40%, based on firm intentions to vote for Radev and Progressive Bulgaria that were repeated month after month. In yesterday’s election, however, that figure in our sample fell to 31–32%. In other words, Radev’s party needs to consolidate its support for Iotova. The vote for Rumen Radev in April was largely a personal vote and a protest vote against Peevski and Borisov. The presidential election now has a somewhat different agenda. It is a more positive agenda.”

Boryana Dimitrova – Alpha Research polling agency: “Whether the decline is personally attributable to Ms Iotova, who has failed to mobilise voters, or whether it should also be seen as a warning to the government itself remains to be seen, because elections are never solely about individual candidates. They are political contests. We are looking at a drop of around 900,000 votes. Yes, we cannot automatically draw a direct link between a party and its candidate. But this is a massive collapse.”

The Myara polling agency reports that more than 300,000 people who identified themselves as having voted for We Continue the Change–Democratic Bulgaria (WCC–DB) in April cast ballots in this election. This represents a significantly higher level of voter mobilisation than among those who voted for GERB and the Movement for Rights and Freedoms (MRF).

Parvan Simeonov – Myara polling agency: “The small number of GERB voters who turned out — no more than 100,000 — voted predominantly for Gyurov. The even smaller number of MRF voters who turned out — perhaps around 50,000 — voted predominantly for Iotova.”

Voter mobilisation was also strong among Vazrazhdane supporters. One-tenth of yesterday’s vote came from people who said they had voted for Kostadinov’s party in April.