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2007 European Parliament election in Bulgaria

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Field	Value
country	Bulgaria
next_election	[2009](2009-european-parliament-election-in-bulgaria)
seats_for_election	All 18 Bulgarian seats in the European Parliament
election_date	20 May 2007
turnout	29.22%
first_election	yes
party1	GERB
leader1	Dushana Zdravkova
seats1	5
percentage1	21.68
party2	Coalition for Bulgaria
leader2	Kristian Vigenin
seats2	5
percentage2	21.41
party3	Movement for Rights and Freedoms
leader3	Filiz Husmenova
seats3	4
percentage3	20.26
party4	Attack (political party)
leader4	Dimitar Stoyanov
seats4	3
percentage4	14.20
party5	National Movement for Stability and Progress
leader5	Bilyana Raeva
seats5	1
percentage5	6.27

European Parliament elections were held in Bulgaria on 20 May 2007. It was the country's first European election, having joined the Union on 1 January of that year. The country still had 18 MEPs, no change from before the election. Until Bulgaria could hold these elections, the country was represented by MEPs appointed by the National Assembly.

The top two parties – GERB and Bulgarian Socialist Party (BSP) – won 5 seats each, followed by the Movement for Rights and Freedoms (DPS) with four, Ataka with three, and National Movement Simeon II (NDSV) with one. Voter turnout was 28.6%.

It was considered likely that the result of the election would cause a major political crisis in Bulgaria, due to the expected weak results of the National Movement.

Controversially, the eligible voters were limited to citizens of Bulgaria and the EU with their permanent and current address within the Union and a minimum of 60 days of the last three months before the elections spent within its borders. Because of this requirement, 232,800 people were rendered ineligible to vote, 185,000 of whom were Turkish Bulgarians resident in Turkey.

Contesting parties

The following parties contested the elections:

Coalition of the Bulgarian Agrarian People's Union
Communist Party of Bulgaria
Coalition of Bulgarian Social Democrats (Party of Bulgarian Social Democrats, Political Movement "Social Democrats")
GERB
Civil Union for New Bulgaria
Democrats for a Strong Bulgaria
European Socialists Platform (Bulgarian Socialist Party, Movement for Social Humanism)
Green Party of Bulgaria
Movement for Rights and Freedoms
National Movement Simeon II
Attack
Order, Law and Justice
Union of the Democratic Forces
Union of Free Democrats
two independents

The People's First Movement had registered to contest the election, but were refused by the Central Electoral Commission.

The five Bulgarian nurses sentenced to death and the Bulgarian doctor who received a lighter sentence in the HIV trial in Libya were slated to stand as the six leading candidates on the list of the populist Order, Law and Justice Party – to put pressure on Libya to release the nurses and to postpone their execution because of the immunity they would have as MEPs. They were refused by the Central Electoral Commission, however, as they did not meet the residency requirements.

Pre-election situation

18 MEPs were appointed by Bulgaria to serve as observers in the Parliament before the country joined on 1 January 2007. Those observers then functioned as Bulgaria's appointed delegation to the European Parliament until elections were held on 20 May 2007. The breakdown of parties and their European Parliament political groups for the period 1 January 2007 to 20 May 2007 was as follows:

Party	Group	Seats
Bulgarian Socialist Party	PES	6
National Movement Simeon II	ALDE	4
Movement for Rights and Freedoms	ALDE	3
Union of Democratic Forces	EPP-ED	2
Democrats for a Strong Bulgaria	EPP-ED	1
Bulgarian People's Union	EPP-ED	1
Attack	ITS	1

Results

The official results were announced by the Central Electoral Commission on 21 May. According to the official data, the winner of the elections was GERB, followed by a small margin by the Bulgarian Socialist Party and the Movement for Rights and Freedoms, with the distance between the third and the first being less than 1.5%. The voter turnout was 28.6%.

Elected MEPs

According to the election results, the following 18 candidates were elected as Bulgarian Members of the European Parliament:

GERB (5)
- Dushana Zdravkova
- Vladimir Uruchev
- Nickolay Mladenov
- Petya Stavreva
- Rumiana Jeleva
Bulgarian Socialist Party (5)
- Kristian Vigenin
- Iliana Iotova
- Atanas Paparizov
- Marusya Lyubcheva
- Evgeni Kirilov
Movement for Rights and Freedoms (4)
- Filiz Husmenova
- Mariela Baeva
- Metin Kazak
- Vladko Panayotov
Attack (3)
- Dimitar Stoyanov
- Slavcho Binev
- Desislav Chukolov
National Movement Simeon II (1)
- Bilyana Raeva

References

"Bulgarien: EU-Wahl wird Zerreißprobe für Sofia «". Diepresse.com.
"185 000 изселници в Турция извън избирателните списъци за евровота". mediapool.bg.
(15 April 2007). "People's Daily Online – Bulgarian parties, independent runners ready for EP voting". People's Daily.
(29 March 2007). "Bulgaria: Bulgaria's Jailed Nurses Top MEP Ticket". Novinite.com.
"ЦИКЕП :: Избирателна активност".
(24 May 2007). "News.bg – ГЕРБ и БСП с по 5-има евродепутати, обяви официално ЦИК". News.ibox.bg.

Info: Wikipedia Source

This article was imported from Wikipedia and is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Content has been adapted to SurfDoc format. Original contributors can be found on the article history page.

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