Bulgaria’s CEC announces seat distribution after June 9 parliamentary election
Bulgaria’s Central Election Commission (CEC) has announced the seat distribution in the 50th National Assembly, with the full list of MPs set to be made public next week.
Former Prime Minister Boiko Borissov’s GERB-Union of Democratic Forces electoral coalition were allocated 68 seats, one fewer than after the April 2023 early election, after receiving 24.7 per cent of the votes in the National Assembly election, held alongside the European Parliament election on June 9.
Predominantly ethnic Turk Movement for Rights and Freedoms (MRF) won 47 seats, up from 36 it had in the 49th National Assembly, as it finished second in the voting with 17.07 per cent.
The We Continue the Change-Democratic Bulgaria (WCC-DB) electoral coalition will have 39 MPs in the next Parliament, having won 14.33 per cent of the vote. It won 64 seats in April 2023.
Pro-Russian Vuzrazhdane party will have 38 MPs – it had won 37 seats in last year’s election, but saw its parliamentary group reduced to 34 after the expulsion of several members. It received 13.78 per cent of the vote on June 9.
Support for Bulgarian Socialist Party (BSP) continues to decline and the party received 7.06 per cent of the vote, despite the lower turnout compared to the April 2023 election. It will have 19 MPs, four fewer than in the previous Parliament.
Cable presenter Slavi Trifonov’s ITN will have 16 MPs, up from 11 in the 49th National Assembly, after winning 5.96 per cent of the vote.
It will no longer be the smallest group in Parliament, that distinction going to populist-nationalist Velichie, which cleared the four per cent threshold for the first time and will have 13 MPs after receiving 4.65 per cent of the vote.
CEC will finalise the list of MPs elected no later than June 17, after candidates who were elected in more than one electoral district or to both the National Assembly and European Parliament choose which seat they will take, while some candidates initially deemed elected may inform the commission that they did not want to take up their seats.
(Bulgaria’s National Assembly plenary hall. Photo: parliament.bg)
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