Polls closed in Bulgaria's seventh general election in three years on Sunday evening, with preliminary results suggesting another win for former Prime Minister Boyko Borisov's conservative party.

Borisov's GERB garnered 26.08% of the votes, according to preliminary results based on a partial vote count from the state election commission.

This was followed by the reformist coalition We Continue the Change (PP) at 14.76% and the ultra-nationalist Vazrazhdane (Revival) party at around 13.8%.

According to an exit poll showing similar results by Alpha Research, GERB was likely to get around 74 seats in the 240-seat parliament, while PP could get 42 seats, and Revival 36 seats respectively.

Sunday's vote was called after the seven groups elected in a June vote did not succeed in forming a workable coalition.

Bulgaria has been run by short-lived governments since 2020 when anti-graft protests helped to end a coalition led by the GERB party.

Voter turnout was 38%.

Pro-Russian party looms large

Going into the election, Borissov's center-right GERB party was tipped to finish first but was seen as struggling to form a viable coalition amid a splintered parliament.

Pollsters had predicted that the main pro-Russia party, Vazrazhdane, had a good chance of becoming the second-largest bloc in the legislature, but exit polls suggest a weaker result.

Vazrazhdane wants Bulgaria to lift sanctions on Russia over its invasion of Ukraine and for the country to cease providing aid to Kyiv, while also calling the country's NATO membership into question. 

It has gained popularity since proposing a Russian-inspired law banning LGBTQ "propaganda" that was passed by a large majority in Parliament in August.

The We Continue the Change/Democratic Bulgaria bloc, which seeks to bolster the country's position in the EU, appears to have performed better than expected.

Bulgaria has been an EU member since 2007, but is at risk of losing billions of euros in EU recovery funds because of its lack of reforms.

It has yet to join the eurozone and be fully integrated into the open-border Schengen zone.

Widespread corruption

Bulgaria is one of the poorest and most corrupt nations in the EU and efforts to combat graft have been largely stymied by a judiciary that is seen as often acting in the interest of certain politicians.

The country has been in a period of political instability since 2020, when Bulgarians across the country took to the streets in protest at the takeover of state institutions by oligarchs enabled by corrupt politicians.

That instability, along with disinformation coming from Moscow, has fostered the popularity of pro-Russian and far-right groups in the former Soviet satellite state.

mm, tj/wd (AP, AFP, Reuters)