site.btaUPDATED Top Vote Getters' First Comments after Close of Polls

The contestants in Bulgaria's elections for National Assembly and European Parliament on Sunday evening were rather non-committal in their comments after exit polls were inconclusive about the top vote getters' ranking except the uncontested winner, GERB-UDF.

GERB

"Nobody succeeds without acknowledging the help of others," GERB leader Boyko Borissov wrote on Facebook Sunday evening after all exit polls showed that the GERB-UDF coalition has won both the national parliamentary and the European elections.

"We are confident and gratefully acknowledge this help. Thank you, GERB! Thank you all who backed us!" he concluded his remarks. For the time being, GERB are reserving further comments on polling day and the voting results.

MP candidates Denitsa Sacheva, Yordanka Fandakova, Georgi Georgiev and Toma Bikov and MEP candidate Andrey Kovachev came to the GERB headquarters in Sofia but declined to comment.

Continue the Change

In a message to their supporters after the close of the polls on Sunday evening, Continue the Change vowed to be "strong opposition to Borissov and Peevski". Borissov is the leader of GERB and Peevski is one of the two leaders of the Movement for Rights and Freedoms (MRF). "We heard your voice and we will be a strong opposition to the plans of Borissov and Peevski to take us back to the years of belt-tightening and extortion," Continue the Change leader Kiril Petkov wrote in a Facebook post.

Continue the Change had a similar post on Facebook: "Thank you! We heard your Voice! We will use the support that you gave us to be a strong opposition to the plans of Borissov and Peevski, and a third 'fig leaf' to take us back to the years of belt-tightening, to cement their control over the services, the regulators and the judiciary for years to come."

Continue the Change promise to fight for Bulgaria's European path and stand up against any attempt at corruption and theft of tax-payers' money.

Movement for Rights and Freedoms

"I believe that the MRF and I personally will live up to the great trust you placed in us," Movement for Rights and Freedoms (MRF) Chair Delyan Peevski said in a Facebook post on Sunday evening.

Peevski thanked all MRF voters for their support. "I thank each one of you who lend us your confidence," he wrote.

"I am honoured to accept the responsibility which you gave us by your trust and support," the MRF Chair pointed out. "We are ready to shoulder this responsibility together with the people because they are our backing and bulwark."

Vazrazhdane

In an election night video posted on the social media, the leader of the nationalist Vazrazhdane party, Kostadin Kostadinov, reiterated that they would not back another party's cabinet and expressed the hope that his party would emerge as the second largest political force. "Voter turnout was terribly low," he said.

"Anything can be rigged but not the voter turnout," he added. "Today the Bulgarian people gave their own country a big slap on the face. The Bulgarian people said that this country is not theirs, and this is perhaps the most important takeaway from these elections. We have a most frustrated, increasingly alienated and apathetic people. Any oligarch who can mobilize a structure can get his own party into parliament to use it to trade in power. The best thing about recent years is that we have had the right to elect. But now 70% are giving up this right, and that is the same as giving up freedom. We will continue to try to convince people that the salvation of the Bulgarian people is in their own hands. It is up to each and every one of us to decide the future of Bulgaria."

Kostadinov thanked everyone who voted for his party.

There Is Such a People

There Is Such a People (TISP) deputy leader Toshko Yordanov said in an election night comment that his party is the only political force which has just seen an increase in voter support by over 50%. "Objectively, TISP is the only political force which has upped its support by over 50%," he told a news briefing outside the party headquarters.

Yordanov said his party would wait for the election administration to release the final results before they make further comment.

TISP Secretary Stanislav Balabanov thanked voters for their support and the party structures for their hard work during the campaign.

Grandeur

"Our data show that we have won between 5 and 9% of the vote, it should be more. We will have an MEP, too," Grandeur Party leader Ivelin Mihaylov said on National Television Sunday evening.

Asked why Grandeur is not together with the Vazrazhdane Party, Mihaylov answered that they have different views of what should happen. "We believe that the economy must be set in motion so that we could have internal cash flows instead of counting on external ones all the time," the Grandeur leader added.

"Vazrazhdane's basic position is that Bulgaria's bad situation is due to external factors, whereas we believe that internal factors are to blame. We do not want to leave the EU and NATO because this is not a priority for a state. For this reason, we do not have a problem with the EU and NATO, we have a problem with domestic corruption, the internal problems in the country, and we must tackle them," he explained.

Nikolay Markov, who is Grandeur's top-of-the list candidate in the European elections, said that the first thing to be expected is to restore the parliamentary republic which, in his opinion, does not exist in Bulgaria now. Markov argued that there is no rule of law. "We intend you to show you real policy making and how missing things get done fast," the candidate added.