Russia-Aligned Radev on Track for Emphatic Bulgaria Election Win

Rumen Radev, a Russia-aligned former president, looks on course for an emphatic win in Bulgaria's election on Sunday, but may still have to team up with at least one other party to form a governing majority. Radev's newly created Progressive Bulgaria movement was on track to secure around 40 percent of the vote, according to projections broadcast on television after the polls closed. That meant he had more than twice the support of any other party. Whether he can win an outright majority will depend on how many minor parties make it into parliament — past the 4 percent threshold. If he needs partners in government, the big question is whether he will seek to form a majority with pro-EU liberal reformists (on about 14 percent), or whether he will ally himself with the Socialist party (on about 4 percent) and nationalists (on about 5 percent), which could allow him to form a pro-Moscow governing bloc. In remarks immediately after the vote, Radev hinted he could find common ground with the pro-Brussels reformist camp over shaking up the corruption-plagued judiciary. "I am ready to go with different options so Bulgaria can have a functional and stable government," he said. The election is the Balkan country's eighth in five years — amid rolling political crises and fragile coalitions — and 62-year-old former air force commander Radev has been seeking to pull together a new political party to break the impasse. Radev has established his political reputation by casting himself as an enemy of the country's oligarchic "mafia state," but his opponents argue his policies often align with the Kremlin's, particularly on the war in Ukraine. Radev has encouraged Ukraine to sue for peace, does not support sending arms to Kyiv and says his insistence that Crimea is "Russian" simply reflects a strategic reality. He is also a critic of Sofia's accession to the euro this year, arguing the new currency has stoked inflation. In his remarks after voting on Sunday morning, Radev said the election was an opportunity to "take back" the country from oligarchs, but also called for relations of "mutual respect" with Moscow, based on Russia's role in liberating Bulgaria from the Ottoman empire in 1878. While these positions have helped him build up a base of support at home, he has avoided direct confrontation with the West and has generally fallen in step with the European mainstream when attending European Council meetings in Brussels. European funds are vital to the EU's poorest member country and Bulgarian leaders have traditionally avoided any provocative antics in Brussels in the style of outgoing Hungarian leader Viktor Orbán. A senior EU diplomat said Radev was nowhere close to Orbán as a disruptive force. They said Radev was in a "much different league" when it comes to his ability, and desire, to upend policy. He and others like Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico "don't come close [to Orbán] in experience, tenacity, network and ideas," the diplomat added. In the days before the election, former MiG-29 pilot Radev pushed back against the accusations that he was pro-Russian. "I don't see what kind of pro-Russian position I have. I have completely pro-Bulgarian positions, I have pro-European positions," he said. He refuses to go to into coalition with Bulgaria's two most prominent politicians — former Prime Minister Boyko Borissov of the GERB party and Delyan Peevski, leader of the DPS-New Beginning party — accusing them of being at the top of the "oligarchic pyramid" running the mafia state. Assen Vassilev, leader of the reformist We Continue the Change party, hinted at potential co-operation with Radev by prioritizing judicial reform. "The most important thing … to say this evening is that Bulgarians citizens turned out, voted and left GERB and DPS in the past," he said. Gabriel Gavin contributed reporting. This article is being updated.