Bulgaria's Ruling Party Fails to Topple Turkish Hegemony in Kardzhali

Ethnic Turks and mayor Hasan Azis (in the middle) celebrate his victory for a third term in downtown Kardzhali in the middle of the night. Photo by BGNES

The Bulgarian ruling party's joy over what was believed to be a breakthrough in the town of Kardzhali, an ethnic Turkish stronghold, has proved short-lived.

Hasan Azis, the incumbent mayor, nominated by the ethnic Movement for Rights and Freedoms and seeking re-election for his third term, has garnered 53.9% of the votes, scoring an outright victory, official results showed on Monday.

Exit polls from the elections day suggested that Kardzhali has surprisingly sent its incumbent mayor to a run-off with the candidate of the ruling GERB party Ilia Iliev.

Milko Bagdasarov, nominated by the Bulgarian Socialist Party (BSP), finished third.

Upon the news of an expected run-off in the town f Kardzhali, the leaders of the ruling party were quick to boast of managing to topple the bastion of Dogan, leader of the ethnic Turkish Movement for Rights and Freedoms, who has widely been considered the country's back seat ruler over the last decade.

A little later into the night, however, as the first official results began to come in, the incumbent mayor Azis started to accumulate votes and surpassed the 50% threshold needed for a first-round win.

Four years ago during the previous local elections split vote paved the way for Hasan Azis to his second term in office.

Azis, backed by the Movement for Rights and Freedoms, garnered 56,3 % of the votes. Hasan Azis' bid for a second term was challenged by three candidates, who set out on a crusade to topple the hegemony of the ethnic Turkish party.

Analysts commented back then that the number of candidates scattered the votes against the ethnic Turkish party and made his re-election easier.

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