site.btaUPDATED Socialist Leader Says Party Electorate Is Growing, Urges Them to Vote "against GERB" in Runoffs

At a news conference she held after the official results of the October 29 local elections were announced on Tuesday, Bulgarian Socialist Party (BSP) leader Korneliya Ninova boasted a growing electorate for her party and urged them to vote "against GERB" in the second round of the elections this coming Sunday.

“We have 44 municipal mayors elected in the first round, which makes us the second political force after GERB in that round,” said Ninova. “GERB won in 72 municipalities, we did in 44, where the candidates were nominated or supported by the BSP National Council,” she added.

Ninova noted that her party will take part in 45 runoffs, including in large regional centres such as Sofia, Shumen, Razgrad, Ruse, Silistra and Haskovo.

She said that BSP came either first or second in 89 municipalities, which accounts for one-third of the municipalities in Bulgaria. “BSP is the first or second political force in 30% of Bulgaria. This confirms the statement we made on election night, namely that the BSP is making the comeback to local government, strongly at that,” Ninova said.

“Both in terms of the number of mayors and support for the party lists, BSP’s results mark an increase in these elections compared to the parliamentary elections and the number of mayors we have had so far. We expect to win a lot in the runoffs,” Ninova said.

“We urge everyone to vote against GERB in the runoffs,” she added.

Asked to comment on GERB Leader Boyko Borissov’s statement that BSP’s Sofia mayor candidate Vanya Grigorova is better than Continue the Change - Democratic Bulgaria’s Vassil Terziev, Ninova said that this is completely unacceptable.

“I expect our candidate to distance herself from Borissov’s words,” she added. “The point of the battle for Sofia after 18 years of GERB rule is to change this government, and I cannot imagine that our candidate will be elected with the votes of GERB whose governance model we, the party and the nominated candidates, are all fighting against,” Ninova said.

She said that her formation is seeking support for Grigorova from other parties, but it has not held talks with GERB or Borissov. “What he said today about such support raises a lot of questions – in exchange for what, has anyone said something? We have not,” the BSP leader added. She said that her party has not held talks about Sofia with the Movement for Rights and Freedoms.

Taking a question about the Left coalition, Ninova said: “It is always good to have left-wing people united, to have left-wing representation of voters, but we should not draw a general conclusion from the result in Sofia. The same coalition, for example, took part in the election in Blagoevgrad, but our candidate failed to advance to the runoff,” she added.

As to the Supreme Administrative Court's ruling to revoke a decision by the Central Election Commission that eliminated voting machines from the local elections, Ninova said that the court's decision should be upheld.