Bulgarian PM Borissov says will not take seat in next Parliament
Bulgarian Prime Minister Boiko Borissov said on April 8 that he would not take a seat in the 45th National Assembly and has formally notified the Central Election Commission of his decision.
Borissov stood for election in two electoral districts – in Sofia and Plovdiv – and would have had to choose which he intended to represent in the next Parliament.
“As Prime Minister, I did not have immunity [from prosecution] and I do not need it now,” he said in a Facebook post.
His party GERB won the largest share of the vote in the April 4 elections, with 26.2 per cent, but is seen as unlikely to form a government, as other parties and coalitions set to be represented in the next National Assembly have said that they would not back a GERB cabinet.
On election night, Borissov said that he was willing to back an ‘expert Cabinet’ to tackle the Covid-19 pandemic and avoid instability caused by new snap parliamentary elections, but his proposal has received no support from other parties and coalitions set to be represented in the next National Assembly.
Borissov has also previously indicated that he was prepared to put a name other than his own as Prime Minister-designate when President Roumen Radev hands GERB the mandate to form a government.
Speaking to Bulgarian National Television on April 7, Foreign Minister Ekaterina Zaharieva said that GERB would nominate someone other than Borissov as head of government, but said that talks about potential nominees had not been held yet.
In his Facebook post on April 8, Borissov hailed GERB’s election results, saying that it came first in 24 of the 31 electoral districts, and called on other parties not to downplay the importance of the votes cast for his party.
“Let us respect one another, behind every politician are the votes of many people. My call is to not offend voters, we are all Bulgarian citizens,” he said.
Borissov was first elected to Parliament in 2005 and in each of the five parliamentary elections since then. He only took his MP seat in 2013, serving as parliamentary group leader when his party was in opposition to the short-lived Plamen Oresharski government.
(Boiko Borissov photo: government.bg)
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