Bulgaria’s ex-president Radev claims victory, bullish on election outcome
Bulgaria’s former president Roumen Radev, whose Progressive Bulgaria electoral coalition was set to win the largest number of seats in the 52nd National Assembly, claimed “categorical” victory on election night on April 19.
As preliminary unofficial vote-counts by polling agencies showed his party winning an outright majority in the 240-seat Parliament, Radev stopped short of claiming that his party would be able to form a government on its own.
One count, by Alpha Research polling agency, based on a small representative sample of actual ballots cast in the election, put Progressive Bulgaria on 43.5 per cent, with 50 per cent of its sample counted. That would give Radev’s party 129 seats in Parliament.
Radev said that it was too early to comment on final results, but appeared confident, even if he limited his remarks to describing his coalition’s results as “a victory of hope over distrust, freedom over fear, a victory for morality, if you will.”
“People rejected the self-satisfaction and arrogance of old parties and did not fall pray to lies and manipulation. I thank them for their trust,” Radev said.
Asked, in English, about prospective relations with the EU, Radev said “Bulgaria will pay efforts to continue its European path, but a strong Bulgaria in a strong Europe needs critical thinking, needs pragmatism, because Europe has fallen a victim to its own ambition to be a moral leader in a world without rules.
“What Europe needs right now is critical thinking, pragmatic actions and good results, especially building a new security architecture and paying a lot of efforts to recover its industrial power and competitiveness. That will be the main contribution of Bulgaria to its European mission,” he said, in English.
(Roumen Radev photo from Progressive Bulgaria website)
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