site.btaGERB-UDF to Decline Government-Forming Mandate, Leader Warns of "Even Bigger Chaos"

The GERB-UDF parliamentary group will return the government-forming mandate unfulfilled as soon as it receives it from President Rumen Radev on Monday, the group's floor leader and GERB party leader Boyko Borissov said on Friday. "We will receive and return the mandate, but I warn you that the chaos will grow bigger, the hatred among the parties will intensify, because there is no political class that can reach understanding," Borissov said in a video statement streamed live from Vratsa via his Facebook profile.

Earlier on Friday, the President's press secretariat said that the head of state, Rumen Radev, will hand the first mandate to form a government to the largest parliamentary group in the 51st National Assembly, GERB-UDF. The move is part of a standard procedure which follows the resignation of Prime Minister Rosen Zhelyazkov's government, which was announced on December 11 and accepted by the National Assembly the following day.