Politics

Bulgarians voting in 2nd round of presidential election

Incumbent leader Rumen Radev faces university rector Anastas Gerdzhikov in runoff vote

Ihvan Radoykov  | 21.11.2021 - Update : 22.11.2021
Bulgarians voting in 2nd round of presidential election

SOFIA, Bulgaria

Voters in Bulgaria are casting their ballots to elect a new president in a runoff election on Sunday.

The Balkan country are heading to the polls again as the voter turnout was only 40.2% and no candidate collected more than half the votes in the first round.

Incumbent President Rumen Radev, who won 49.4% of the vote in the first round, is facing the Sofia University rector, in the second round.

Gerdzhikov, who was nominated by former Prime Minister Boyko Borissov’s Citizens for European Development of Bulgaria (GERB) party, received 22.8% of the votes in the first round.

Mustafa Karadayi, head of the Movement for Rights and Freedoms (MRF) party, the only candidate representing ethnic Turks and other Muslims, came third in the first round with 11.5% of the votes.

Over 6.6 million citizens are registered to vote at 13,200 polling stations in Bulgaria and 750 centers in 67 other countries.

Turkey, home to many dual Bulgarian nationals, has 58 polling stations for Sunday’s vote.

Bulgaria’s Interior Ministry assigned more than 16,000 personnel to ensure the security of the election process.

The voting will end at 8 p.m. local time (1800GMT).


*Writing by Zehra Nur Duz


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