Ninova: ‘Plan to kill off Bulgarian Socialist Party failed this time’
Having led her party to its worst-ever election result, Bulgarian Socialist Party (BSP) leader Kornelia Ninova told a news conference on April 4 that “the plan to kill off the BSP has failed this time”.
According to the Central Election Commission (CEC), the BSP got 225 814 votes – 8.94 per cent of the ballots cast – in Bulgaria’s April 2 2023 early parliamentary elections.
This will make the BSP the second-smallest of the six groups in the 49th National Assembly.
The top figures in the coalitions that got the largest share of the vote on April 2 – Boiko Borissov’s GERB-UDF and the We Continue the Change-Democratic Bulgaria coalition – have yet to comment publicly on the election results.
Reportedly, Borissov will not comment before April 6, the deadline for the CEC to announce the seat allocation in the newly-elected Parliament.
Ninova said that it would have been correct to wait for the first- and second-largest groups to speak, and described their silence as “strange”.
She said that in spite of the “pressure” on the BSP, it had “roughly maintained” its previous result.
CEC official results show that in the previous early parliamentary elections in Bulgaria, on October 2 2022, the BSP got 9.3 per cent, with 232 958 votes.
In the October elections, Ninova – who has headed the BSP since 2016 – led the BSP to what was then its worst-ever election result. However, that result exceeds its April figure by 7144 votes.
Ninova said that during the entire campaign before the April 2 vote there had been a “manipulative and well-organised campaign” against the BSP.
“All along it has been suggested that the BSP is finished as a party. Well, the plan to kill off the BSP has failed this time,” she said.
Ninova directed her fire at The Left coalition, a grouping of former BSP figures. She said that The Left had been backed with “a lot of finance” and had had the support of the caretaker government.
“In many places, district governors appointed by President (Roumen) Radev worked for The Left. We have evidence of this,” said Ninova, without offering any.
“They (The Left) were created not to enter Parliament, but to harm the BSP – and they achieved that, because of those 50 000 votes are BSP votes,” she said.
Ninova said that after Parliament is convened, the BSP parliamentary group would decide whether to accept an offer to be part of a governing coalition or whether to be in opposition.
Radev, speaking on April 4, said that the most important result of the parliamentary elections “is that we will have a Parliament”.
“I hope that this Parliament will work sooner – to resume legislative activity and provide a sustainable solution to the political crisis by forming a consensus majority around clear policies, goals and priorities and installing a stable and working regular government,” he said.
(Photo: BSP)
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