Discrepancies in Bulgarian Election Results: Did 'Greatness' Lose Votes to Other Parties?

Following the announcement of the official election results in Bulgaria, it has become evident that 21 votes were missing for the "Greatness" party, preventing them from entering parliament. However, an investigation by the Bulgarian National Television (BNT) revealed that at least 28 votes originally meant for "Greatness" were reallocated to other parties. This conclusion was drawn from a comparison of vote counts conducted in front of the cameras at several polling stations and the corresponding protocols.

Some votes for "Greatness" appeared one row up or down on the scoreboard. During BNT’s random checks of protocols and video surveillance, discrepancies were identified between the counts recorded on camera and those documented in the official protocols. These votes did not go unused; rather, they were attributed to other parties. Parties such as the Socialist Party "Bulgarian Path" and "Bulgari" benefitted from these votes in various sections located in Plovdiv-city, Plovdiv-region, Ruse, and Sofia.

This raises the question of whether these discrepancies were simply errors resulting from commission fatigue or intentional alterations to the results. Regardless of the cause, any mistake made by the sectional commissions will be reviewed by the regional commission. BNT’s analysis found no discrepancies between the minutes of the sectional and regional commissions examined by the media. This case not only involves "Greatness" but also calls into question the overall accuracy of the election result reporting and whether other parties may have similarly lost votes.

The misallocation of votes is reflected both in the protocols of the Sectional Election Commissions (SICs) and those of the Regional Election Commission (REC), resulting in the final count showing 3,999 or 21 missing votes.

During its meeting yesterday, the Central Election Commission (CEC) resolved to request information from the "Information Service" regarding the video surveillance conducted during the ballot counting. This includes detailed data on the number of cameras used, their locations, and areas where there was no internet connection. The findings of this analysis, along with its timeframe, are awaited with great interest.

Today, The "Greatness" party accused Boyko Borissov of GERB and Delyan Peevski of DPS-New Beginning of electoral fraud in the elections. At a press conference, party leader Ivelin Mihailov claimed the elections were rigged and that the official results, which left "Greatness" just 3.999% short of the representation threshold with 97,438 votes, do not reflect the true voter sentiment. Mihailov alleged that widespread intimidation and manipulation were employed to secure power for Borissov and Peevski, emphasizing the influence of organized crime within state institutions. Yordan Mitsikulev, also from "Greatness," reported 1,989 discrepancies between written protocols and machine data, with 3,098 protocols indicating violations, asserting that the Central Election Commission (CEC) allowed multiple votes from individuals and presented video evidence of cash distribution at polling sites.