Voting underway in Bulgaria’s eighth parliamentary elections since 2021
Voting has got underway in Bulgaria’s April 19 2026 elections, the eighth time since April 2021 that Bulgarians are electing a National Assembly.
The current elections follow the December 2025 resignation of the Zhelyazkov elected government and the subsequent process of offering mandates to try to get a new government elected having proven fruitless.
Of the seven previous elections in the past five years, only three produced elected governments, none of which served a full four-term.
By noon on April 19, some problems with voting machines had been reported, but with the Ministry for E-government saying that only 0.3 per cent of the machines had malfunctioned.
The Central Electoral Commission (CEC) said that as of 11am, voter turnout nationally was 12.12 per cent. According to the CEC’s archive, in the previous parliamentary elections, in October 2024, at that hour voter turnout was 9.55 per cent.
Voting is scheduled to end at 8pm, but may be extended to 9pm if there are people still in the queue to vote.
Publication of exit poll results before 8pm is illegal.
Outside Bulgaria, large queues were reported in London and Istanbul. Recent amendments to the Electoral Code significantly reduced the number of Bulgarian election polling stations that may be opened in places other than embassies and consulates in countries that are not members of the European Union.
Interior Ministry chief secretary Georgi Kandev said on Facebook by that by mid-morning, there had been 93 reports of breaches of electoral law, and eight pre-trial proceedings had been initiated.
Caretaker Interior Minister Emil Dechev has said that immediately after voting ends at 8pm, he will announce publicly the names of parties that have been involved in vote-buying.
