Bulgaria’s likely next prime minister is sceptical about European integration and friendly towards Russia. But he’s not the new Viktor Orbán.
Toppling the oligarchs
Exit polls and early returns last night pointed to a victory for former president Rumen Radev’s centre-left Progressive Bulgaria party with almost 45 per cent of the vote in the country’s eighth election in five years.
Radev, who stepped down after nine years as president in January to contest the election, looks set to become prime minister, but it remained unclear this morning if he will need votes from other parties for a parliamentary majority.
The former air force general is routinely described in foreign media headlines as the pro-Russian candidate and as Moscow’s best hope for influence in the European Union after Viktor Orbán’s fall last week. But this characterisation is not only an oversimplification of Radev’s approach to foreign policy but risks allowing Bulgaria’s European partners to overlook the real causes of his election victory.
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With a population of 6.7 million, Bulgaria has one of the lowest unemployment rates in the EU with an economy that has grown by more than 3 per cent annually for the past few years. But it has the highest rate of poverty and social exclusion with more than 30 per cent of the population categorised as at risk of poverty, almost 10 per cent more than the EU average.
The election was triggered by the fall of Rosen Zhelyazkov’s centre-right coalition last December following huge demonstrations against a budget that would have increased tax and social security contributions. It would have increased the salaries of police, the armed forces and the judiciary while leaving most other workers no better off and burdened with higher taxes.
The political system is plagued by instability and riddled with corruption (Transparency International ranks Bulgaria as the most corrupt EU member state) and Radev’s central campaign promise was to “topple the oligarchy”. The two most prominent faces of that oligarchy are former prime minister Boyko Borissov and media tycoon Delyan Peevski, both of whom lead centre-right, pro-EU parties that have held a grip on Bulgarian politics in recent years.
Yesterday’s election saw support for Borissov’s Citizens for European Development of Bulgaria (GERB) halve to less than 13 per cent, while Peevski’s DPS-New Beginning party won less than 5 per cent of the vote, down from almost 12 per cent in October 2024.
The liberal, reformist We Continue the Change-Democratic Bulgaria (PP-DB) looked set to come in second place with 15 per cent of the vote and they are likely to support Radev’s fight against corruption.
Borissov and his allies sought to make attitudes to the EU and the war in Ukraine the fault line in Bulgarian politics, as opposed to corruption and economic policies. Radev opposed Bulgaria’s adoption of the euro this year and has called for an end to weapons sales to Ukraine, arguing that they are prolonging a war Kyiv cannot win.
Radev wants what he calls relations of “mutual respect” with Moscow and he has spoken of Bulgaria’s Slavic and Orthodox identity and Russia’s role in liberating the country from the Ottoman Empire in 1878. He has described Crimea as Russian but the former general, who earned a master’s degree from a United States Air Force college and supported Bulgaria’s accession to Nato, condemned Vladimir Putin’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022.
Radev has criticised a 10-year defence agreement between Bulgaria and Ukraine and called for a reopening of dialogue between the EU and Moscow, suggesting that he could serve as a useful link between he two.
But he has made clear that he will not use Bulgaria’s veto to block EU decisions on help for Ukraine and unlike Orbán, he is not at the centre of a web of right-wing thinking and influence in Europe.
Bulgaria’s EU partners would be wise to pause before demonising or dismissing Radev as a Kremlin stooge or attempting to strong-arm him into toeing the line on Ukraine as long as he does not block collective action. If he succeeds in tackling corruption and helping Bulgaria to become the “normal European country” its liberals have long aspired to, that will be a greater service to the European interest than any change in Radev’s rhetoric.
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