Radev: Progressive Bulgaria will support Yotova in presidential elections

Prime Minister Roumen Radev said on July 28 that his Progressive Bulgaria party will support Iliana Yotova in the presidential elections in autumn 2026.

Yotova currently is President, having stepped up from the vice-presidential post in January 2026 when Radev resigned as head of state to enter parliamentary politics.

Radev’s Progressive Bulgaria won a decisive majority in this year’s early parliamentary elections, enabling it to govern alone. However, recent opinion polls have shown support for Radev and his government on the slide.

Radev said on July 28: “Today, at an extended meeting of Progressive Bulgaria, together with our coalition partners, we decided to support the candidacy of Iliyana Yotova for president”.

“For 10 years now, Ms. Yotova and I have been fighting a battle to restore statehood and return normality to Bulgarian politics,” Radev said.

“This is an extremely complex and difficult battle. Ms. Yotova is a strong and experienced politician and I am convinced that she will continue with the same energy and responsibility to defend the interests of society and work for consensus between the institutions,” he said.

“Ms. Yotova’s candidacy will be nominated by an initiative committee and it is with this initiative committee that the presidential couple will be announced. I would be happy if we had a vice president with the profile of Ms. Yotova. The vice president must, above all, support the unity of the presidential institution. Ms. Yotova and I have proven that in these nine difficult years we were the only presidential couple that showed unity.”

Yotova confirmed her candidacy and that she would be nominated by an initiative committee when she appeared on public broadcaster Bulgarian National Television’s weekly Panorama talk show on July 25.

“The support of the Bulgarian citizens who meet me on the streets every day and wish me not to give up will be important to me,” Yotova said.

Asked whether she and Radev speak with one voice, Yotova said that each speaks with their own voice, but together in the direction that the majority of the Bulgarian people want – “this is the strength, influence and prosperity of Bulgaria”.

“We speak with one voice about Bulgarian foreign policy, about membership in the European Union and Nato, about the preservation and development of Bulgarian identity, about the return of statehood, for which we worked together with Roumen Radev for nine years side by side,” Yotova said.

“The dialogue between us will continue,” she said

Yotova said that she is setting herself the goal within her term in office to build on what she and Radev had achieved over the past nine years. “Each of us had our differences, but in dialogue we reached common solutions,” she said.

On July 27, the Bulgarian Socialist Party, which won no seats in Parliament in this year’s elections, endorsed Yotova.