site.btaBulgaria Headed to Snap Elections, Appointment of Caretaker Cabinet Next

Bulgaria is headed toward snap parliamentary elections after President Rumen Radev handed the third – and last – exploratory mandate for Cabinet formation to the Alliance for Rights and Freedoms (ARF) on Friday and they immediately returned it unfulfilled. The next steps under the Constitution are the appointment of a caretaker government and scheduling snap parliamentary elections. Until a new parliament is elected and sworn in, the current National Assembly will continue to function.

How Bulgaria reached this point

The procedure for handing government-forming mandates followed the resignation of the government of Prime Minister Rosen Zheyazkov on December 11, 2025, under the pressure of country-wide protests.

In line with the constitutional procedure, President Radev first awarded the government-forming mandate to GERB-UDF, the largest parliamentary group, and then to Continue the Change-Democratic Bulgaria (CC-DB), the second largest. Both formations declined immediately, clearing the way for the third and final mandate.

What the President said on Friday

President Radev said it was no coincidence that he chose to hand the last mandate to the ARF, which is the third-smallest of nine parliamentary groups. He said the formation had been subjected to "brutal pressure from its own political offspring", apparently referring to the MRF-New Beginning led by Delyan Peevski. "You, probably more than anyone else, are aware of the flaws of today's governance model." Many ARF members and supporters had been subjected to pressure and even now they continue to face various forms of influence that are unacceptable in a state governed by the rule of law, he said.

What ARF said on Friday

ARF Floor Leader Hayri Sadakov said as he returned the mandate to the President: "Our parliamentary group authorized me to return the third exploratory mandate unfulfilled, so that through joint efforts we can move towards holding fair, transparent, free and democratic elections". "We returned the mandate immediately, because in this parliament genetic modification cannot produce anything positive," he added.

Reactions and speculations about the election date and caretaker PM

Outgoing Prime Minister Rosen Zhelyazkov Friday declined to speculate on who could be appointed as caretaker prime minister and stressed that the decision rests solely with the President. "Let the President hold meetings with the candidates, hear their motivations, and make his assessment. The decision is entirely his," Zhelyazkov said. 

Vazrazhdane leader Kostadin Kostadinov commented that the choice for caretaker prime minister is between Bulgarian National Bank Deputy Governor Andrey Gurov and "a proxy of Delyan Peevski", the leader of MRF-New Beginning. 

The pool of potential caretaker prime ministers from which the President may choose is limited to the Chairperson of the National Assembly (Raya Nazaryan), the Governor or Deputy Governor of the Bulgarian National Bank (Dimitar Radev, Petar Chobanov, Andrey Gurov and Radoslav Milenkov), the President or a Vice-President of the National Audit Office (Dimitar Glavchev, Margarita Nikolova and Silvia Kadreva) and the National Ombudsman (Velislava Delcheva) or a Deputy Ombudsman (Maria Filipova).

The GERB party has taken a political decision that Parliament Chair Raya Nazaryan will not take on the role of caretaker prime minister. 

Bulgarian National Bank Governor Dimitar Radev told BTA on December 23 that he would not accept the position of caretaker prime minister, as this would call into question the independence of the bank.

Ombudsman Velislava Delcheva said on January 11 that the ombudsman and their deputy should be removed from the list of senior public officials eligible to become caretaker prime minister. She argued that the independence of the ombudsman from the executive must be maintained.

Bulgarian National Audit Office President Dimitar Glavchev was appointed caretaker prime minister on two separate occasions in 2024. 

Vazrazhdane’s Kostadinov Friday called on the President to appoint a caretaker cabinet as soon as possible and issue a decree scheduling elections. He said he was "glad that the ARF returned the mandate as quickly as possible, as it should have been". 

He argued that the earliest possible date for the snap elections is March 22, followed by March 29.

GERB also favour March 29, as do Continue the Change - Democratic Bulgaria.