Bulgaria’s CEC announces adjusted seat distribution in 51st National Assembly
Several hours after Bulgaria’s Constitutional Court ruled to partially invalidate the results of the October 27 2024 parliamentary results, naming 16 MPs whose election was overruled, the country’s Central Election Commission announced on March 13 the adjusted distribution of seats in the 51st National Assembly.
Former Prime Minister Boiko Borissov’s GERB-Union of Democratic Forces electoral coalition, the largest group in Parliament, took the biggest hit, losing three MPs and now has 66 seats.
The We Continue the Change-Democratic Bulgaria (WCC-DB) electoral coalition will have 36 MPs (one fewer than before the Court’s ruling), while pro-Russian Vuzrazhdane will lose two seats and have a total of 33 MPs.
Delyan Peevski’s Movement for Rights and Freedoms (MRF) – New Beginning coalition will have 29 MPs under the adjusted allocation. Although it had two MPs struck off Parliament’s rolls by the Court’s decision, it will get one seat back.
The Bulgarian Socialist Party (BSP)-United Left coalition will lose one seat and have 19 MPs, the same as Ahmed Dogan’s Alliance for Rights and Freedoms (ARF), which lost an MP but gained a seat back under CEC’s recalculation of results.
Cable television presenter Slavi Trifonov’s ITN will have 17 MPs, losing three in the Court’s ruling but getting two seats back, while populist-nationalist Mech will be down to 11 MPs, similarly losing three in the Court’s ruling but getting two seats back.
Velichie, another small nationalist-populist party, which failed to overcome the four per cent parliamentary representation threshold by the slimmest of margins after the results were tallied in October 2024, now is above the threshold and will join Parliament as its smallest group with 10 MPs.
The redistribution of seats in the 51st National Assembly will leave the coalition backing the government of Prime Minister Rossen Zhelyazkov with the slimmest of margins.
GERB-UDF, ITN and BSP-United Left are part of the government, while ARF is backing the Cabinet without being formally part of it. Combined, the four groups will now have 121 MPs in the 240-seat National Assembly, down from 126.
(Photo: parliament.bg)
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