site.btaMedia Review: September 14

OVERVIEW

Presidential election preparations and the campaign dominate the media on Monday. Coverage focuses on the registration of initiative committees, the return of machine voting, the strategies of the main candidates and parties, and the controversy over pardons granted by President Iliana Iotova while she was vice president.

PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION

bTV reports that eight parties and coalitions and 20 initiative committees had registered by the time of the report. The vote will be held under new rules, with machines again becoming the main method of voting and restrictions on the number of polling stations outside the EU removed. The Central Election Commission (CEC) is preparing 12,837 voting machines, which must be repaired and serviced by October 15 before being transferred to the Ministry of Innovation and Digital Transformation for certification. The CEC is also preparing video monitoring and training for precinct election commissions. CEC spokesperson Stoyanka Balova-Tsvetkova said that the report produced by the machine has the status of a protocol, meaning that this is the official result. The Commission is still discussing how machine receipts should be counted. If no candidate is elected in the first round, a runoff will take place on November 1.

Speaking on Bulgarian National Radio (BNR), economist and Bulgaria Can leader Kuzman Iliev said that he sees the presidential election as part of a broader realignment of Bulgarian politics. He said presidential candidate Andrey Gurov is seeking not only an election result but also a position as leader of the liberal political space and may try to consolidate it around a new party after the vote. "These elections are not only about the president," Iliev said. He also said GERB leader Boyko Borissov appears to be signalling to GERB voters not to support Gurov and described this as a strategic mistake. He expects the 2027 Budget debate to take place after the presidential election and warned that higher fuel prices, interest rates and public debt are putting pressure on the economy. He also argued that prices cannot be contained through administrative measures.

Also on BNR, MarketLinks Managing Director Dobromir Zhivkov said he expects the election to go to a second round, with turnout below 50%. "The campaign we are about to enter appears to have much more potential to be a real battle for the presidency," Zhivkov said. He does not expect Progressive Bulgaria's (PB) electoral support to transfer automatically to President Iliana Iotova and expects GERB voters to be less active in the first round but potentially more important in the runoff. Zhivkov sees GERB as trying to limit the damage from its weak performance in the April parliamentary elections. He said the presidential election will test whether the new government can consolidate its support and whether parties on the right can unite.

Trud publishes an interview with political psychologist Antoaneta Hristova who said she sees the campaign of Continue the Change (CC) and Democratic Bulgaria (DB) as aimed primarily at remobilizing their existing electorate rather than expanding it. She says that the parties' immediate objective is to show that they have not lost voters and, if possible, reach the runoff. Hristova sees Iotova's initiative committee as politically broader than Gurov's and says the people included in such committees matter more than their number. "Quantity does not make quality," Hristova said. She describes Borissov's decision not to field a GERB presidential candidate as a weak move and says televised debates between the candidates would be a sign of normalization of the campaign.

Telegraph also covers the election preparations.

CONTROVERSY OVER IOTOVA'S CLEMENCY DECISIONS

Nova TV reports on the legal procedure surrounding the pardon of convicted drug trafficker Ognyan Atanasov, granted by Iotova while she was vice president. Criminal lawyer Lyudmil Rangelov said the case does not in itself show a defect in the pardon procedure. Constitutional law professor Emiliya Siderova said a pardon cannot be revoked or reconsidered, although it can be challenged before the Constitutional Court by institutions entitled to refer cases to it. She added that the final assessment belongs personally to the president or vice president exercising the power of pardon and that the medical commission assists rather than binds that decision.

Mediapool.bg reports that President Iliana Iotova described the controversy as a personal attack during the presidential campaign. She said she accepts responsibility for every signature and can explain every decision. She stated that almost 90% of the pardons concerned health grounds and were based on medical assessments. Iotova said the medical experts in Atanasov's case had concluded that his condition made a return to prison impossible. She also suggested that CC leader Assen Vassilev's attacks may be intended to prevent a substantive debate with Gurov. "I want us to have a campaign based on arguments," Iotova said.

24 Chasa writes that Iotova granted clemency to 28 people during her nine years as vice president, compared with 3,093 people granted clemency by the presidential institution since 1992. The daily notes that Atanasov had already been released from prison on health grounds before Iotova remitted the remaining 10 years of his 15-year sentence in 2022, following an assessment by a seven-member medical commission. The daily also quotes Desislava Ivancheva, who was granted clemency by Iotova in 2025, as urging politicians not to use her case in the campaign. GERB leader Borissov, meanwhile, accused CC and DB of applying a double standard, noting that they did not raise the issue when Atanasov was arrested again on drug charges in 2025.

Speaking on bTV's morning programme, former president Rosen Plevneliev said he considers pardons a personal act of the head of State for which political responsibility cannot be transferred to an expert commission. He said reports that five of Iotova's 28 pardons involved people convicted of drug-related offences point to a broader issue. "The responsibility cannot be transferred to some commission," he said. Plevneliev recalled that he had delegated pardon powers to his vice president during his own term but said he still regarded responsibility as belonging to the presidential institution. He also described one case in which he personally intervened and granted a pardon despite the commission's position.

Trud also covers the topic.

ECONOMY

Speaking on Bulgarian National Television's (BNT) morning programme, Confederation of Independent Trade Unions in Bulgaria (CITUB) President Plamen Dimitrov said the union wants at least a 10% increase in wages in key sectors in the 2027 Budget. He said unresolved issues include the mechanism for setting the minimum wage and measures to promote collective bargaining. Dimitrov also criticized proposals to make it easier to employ minors, warning that further liberalization could interfere with education and increase the risk of violations in sectors involving night or hazardous work. He noted that a pending Constitutional Court case could affect the minimum-wage mechanism for 2027. CITUB supports fiscal consolidation but says it should be combined with targeted wage increases.

24 Chasa writes that Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) modelling shows a Bulgarian entering the labour market at 22, earning the average wage throughout a full career and paying full contributions would receive a gross pension equivalent to 58.5% of pre-retirement earnings. This is above the OECD average of 52% and the EU average of 54.5%. The daily notes that the figure is a long-term model rather than a comparison with current pensions. The average monthly pension was EUR 560.13 in June 2026, while the average gross wage in the second quarter was EUR 1,444, but the two figures are not directly comparable with the OECD model. The OECD expects Bulgaria's replacement rate to fall over the longer term as demographic pressure increases. The daily also provides practical guidance on pension rules, noting that the maximum pension in 2026 is EUR 1,738.40. People without the full contribution record may retire at 67 if they have at least 15 years of actual insurance service, while missing service from defunct employers can in some cases be established through National Social Security Institute archives or court proceedings.

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24 Chasa writes that Bulgaria is expected to replace time-based vignettes for passenger cars with distance-based road charging by the end of 2030 under EU requirements. The daily calculates that once Hemus Motorway is completed, a Sofia-Varna journey could cost around EUR 4 for a car in the highest environmental category, compared with about EUR 13 for an older diesel SUV and EUR 1–2 for an electric vehicle under the options currently being examined. Prime Minister Rumen Radev has linked the future charging model to plans to concession motorways, while Minister of Regional Development and Public Works Ivan Shishkov said the state will continue to maintain alternative roads. National Toll Administration Director Oleg Asenov said the eventual methodology will take vehicle emissions into account.

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Telegraph writes that the new school year begins with a shortage of about 1,300 teachers out of roughly 90,000 teaching staff. The most serious shortages are in Sofia, Plovdiv, Varna and Northwestern Bulgaria, particularly in mathematics, physics, natural sciences and Bulgarian language and literature. The daily cites data from Diyan Stamatov, the head of the Union of Employers in the Public Education System in Bulgaria. The daily adds that 11 schools closed during the previous school year, while Sofia will open its first entirely new school in 30 years, with more than 420 pupils. Despite investment in new buildings and extensions, 46 municipal schools in Sofia still operate in two shifts, while the national goal is to eliminate two-shift schooling by 2030.

ENVIRONMENT

BNT reported that more than 15 buildings and about 200 hectares of forest were destroyed in the major fire near the village of Dimovtsi, Gurkovo Municipality. Gurkovo Mayor Kancho Papazov said the rapid response by firefighters, forestry workers, volunteers, heavy machinery and helicopter crews prevented more serious damage and the need for evacuation. He also warned that the loss of forest creates future risks of erosion and flooding.

bTV also covered the fire, adding that residents came close to evacuation twice as strong winds pushed the flames towards residential areas. Crews continued to patrol the area for smouldering hotspots. Human negligence was considered the probable cause for the disaster. "The situation is calm at the moment," Commissioner Stoyan Kolev said, although teams remained on site because of the steep terrain and risk of renewed fire.