site.btaNext Parliament Likely to Have Eight Parties, Afis Poll Shows

Next Parliament Likely to Have Eight Parties, Afis Poll Shows

Sofia, October 2 (BTA) - Eight formations are likely to enter
the next parliament, shows an Afis polling agency survey,
conducted September 27-30 among 1,200 respondents at the
agency's own expense. The data represents the opinions of the
population with the right to vote.

According to Afis, 33.5 per cent of voters who are determined to
vote will do so for GERB, 20.7 per cent for the Bulgarian
Socialist Party (BSP), 13.7 per cent for the Movement for Rights
and Freedoms (MRF), 7.2 per cent for the Reformist Bloc (RB),
6.7 per cent for Bulgaria without Censorship (BwC), 5.2 per cent
for the Patriotic Front (PF), 4.6 per cent for ABV and 4.4 per
cent for Ataka.

The expected voter turnout is close to the one observed during
the parliamentary elections last May. Some 3.4-3.7 million
voters are expected to cast their ballots, which is 50-55 per
cent of all people with the right to vote, the polling agency
says.

If the election results are almost identical to the projections,
the distribution of seats in the next parliament will be as
follows: 84 MP seats for GERB, 52 for BSP, 34 for MRF, 18 for
the RB, 17 for BwC, 13 for the PF and 11 for Ataka and ABV each.


According to the pollsters, such a distribution shows that
forming a majority will be a difficult task and that a potential
majority will be made up of at least three parties, unless a
broad coalition is formed between the first two political
forces, Afis comments.

The parties which are sure to enter the next parliament are
GERB, BSP and MRF. The RB and BwC are almost sure to enter.
There is a slight chance that the remaining three formations -
PF, ABV and Ataka - will not cross the four per cent threshold
to parliament, which would increase the number of seats for the
top five formations. This, however, would not make it easier for
them to form a stable majority. The agency sees interesting
developments in the Right-wing. The RB's growth has hampered
GERB's.

BSP will surely hold on to its second place, despite the small
difference between the socialists and MRF. The biggest mystery
revolves around the results of the next five parties, support
for which varied throughout the campaign. According to Afis,
precisely these parties could have surprising results on
election day.