Rift Shakes Bulgaria's Right Wing in Elections Aftermath

The leaders of the breaking right-wing Blue Coalition, Martin Dimitrov (r), UDF, and Ivan Kostov (l), DSB. Photo by BGNES

The leader of the Bulgarian right-wing party Union of Democratic Forces (UDF), Martin Dimitrov, declared Tuesday he will ask the November 22 assembly of the National Executive Committee of the party for a confidence vote.

Bulgaria's right-wing Blue Coalition between UDF and the Democrats for Strong Bulgaria (DSB) with leader and former Prime Minister, Ivan Kostov, suffered a crushing defeat at the October presidential elections when their nomination, Rumen Hristov, from DSB, collected the mere 65 000 ballots.

Before the elections, Dimitrov declared readiness to resign in case Hristov's results turn out poor.

The UDF leader now explains his party will lead an independent policy, and will reexamine in detail partnership with all other political formations.

"Compromising will get down to a minimum. I am sick and tired for UDF having to pay for somebody else's sins," Dimitrov stated.

A day earlier, the other Blue Coalition co-Chair, Ivan Kostov, commented the right wing in reality did not run at the presidential and local elections because it was replaced by the so-called "Union of Right-Wing Forces," which ended as a total failure.

Kostov was referring to the new coalition, which emerged at the beginning of September after registering with the Central Election Commission, CEC. The Coalition included UDF, and 6 other smaller right-wing political formations, among them the United Democratic Forces (ODS) party of former Mayor of Sofia, Stefan Sofiyanski, who ran again for the office in the latest elections. The new Coalition attempted to unite the right-wing political spectrum, but did not include UDF's long-term coalition partner DSB.

On Tuesday, Dimitrov blamed Kostov for never, in his entire political career, admitting responsibility for anything at all, and asked the latter to come and talk to him in person, not through the media.

The UDF leader explained he had committed election campaign mistakes such as endorsing a figure like Hristov – an expert, but without any public image and popularity, and the coalition's delayed nomination, saying it needed to be announced two years earlier.

The candidate of the Blue Coalition was, however, among the very first ones to become known to the voters – on June 12, 2011.

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