Bulgaria at the rule of law crossroads: can Rumen Radev become the much-needed game changer?

Rumen Radev just after officially resigning from the Bulgarian presidency on January 23, 2026. He is accompanied by his successor Iliana Iotova. Photo: Anton Chalakov / Shutterstock

At the end of 2025, Bulgaria saw mass anticorruption protests that led to the resignation of Rosen Zhelyazkov’s government (January to December 2025) and paved the way for a snap parliamentary election – the seventh one since 2021. In turn, in January 2026, President Rumen Radev (2017-22 and 2022-26) resigned in the hope of establishing his own political project and running for parliament. In a televised message to the nation, he argued that Bulgaria’s democracy “could not survive” in the hands of “corrupt officials, their accomplices and extremists”. He also said that he felt obliged to “defend statehood, the institutions, and the [nation’s] future”. As a result, Vice-President Iliana Iotova became president. She appointed a new caretaker government led by Andrey Gyurov in February, and scheduled the snap parliamentary election on April 19th 2026.

The latest polls from February show that Radev’s future party may get 33.3 per cent of the vote, beating Boyko Borissov’s GERB by nearly 15 per cent. Where will these votes come from? More importantly, will Radev’s participation in the next election lead to the dismantling of the autocracy built by Boyko Borissov’s GERB and Delyan Peevski’s DPS parties and, respectively, to the strengthening of Bulgaria’s rule of law?

Some prehistory: five years of voter betrayal by the opposition

The dynamic changes on the Bulgarian political stage in the past two months are just the latest episodes in the rule of law crisis that sparked the mass anticorruption protests of 2020, which, in turn, perpetuated a parliamentary election spiral. Nevertheless, for the past five years, voters who want to see meaningful steps towards strengthening the rule of law have been betrayed by opposition parties more interested in striking deals with the establishment behind-the-scenes rather than in delivering on their promises. By consequence, not only has voter turnout been steadily decreasing, but also many disappointed citizens have become swing voters (see Table 1 below). The dynamics of voter betrayal by opposition parties, however, conditioned radical changes in the composition of parliament as voters eventually decided to show the red card to those who shamelessly lied to them.

For the first time in many years, GERB lost a parliamentary election in July 2021, which gave many false hopes that the end of autocracy was near. “There Is Such People” (ITN) came in first, earning 24.08 per cent of the vote. Yet, instead of working together with other opposition forces to form a government, they made a controversial “take it or leave it” offer for a cabinet composed of “experts” suspiciously close to Bulgaria’s establishment. This essentially prolonged the political agony and plunged the country into the next snap election.

Unsurprisingly, support for ITN plummeted to 9.52 per cent in the November 2021 election. ITN’s quick demise, however, made room for new contenders to play knights in shining armour on the political stage. This was particularly true regarding the “We Will Continue the Change” (PP) party, which won the November 2021 election, earning 25.26 per cent of the vote. In a twist of irony, the government led by Kiril Petkov (December 2021 to July 2022), then co-leader of PP, which was, in practice, a coalition between PP, DB, ITN and BSP, fell after a successful “no confidence” vote supported by ITN. While the coalition itself can be seen as a hodgepodge formation with an unstable construction because it united forces from different parts of the political spectrum, it is clear that ITN had successfully played the role of a “Trojan horse”. It formally joined forces with the establishment and revealed what values it truly stood for, exactly when Petkov’s government was fine-tuning the texts of anti-corruption bills.

While Petkov’s government can thus be perceived as a casualty of the deep state, PP’s subsequent controversial choices put into question its own pretences to be an authentic opposition force. Instead of running on its own in the April 2023 election, it ran as a coalition with “Democratic Bulgaria” (DB). While DB had been part of Petkov’s government, offering voters a PPDB package raised suspicions about PP’s ulterior motives. DB itself is a complex entity because it is a coalition between parties many of whose recognizable personalities are dangerously close to Borissov – some of them were even part of Borissov’s first and second governments while others have a history of alignment with his GERB party in parliament. As some of PP’s original voters see DB as part of the establishment, expectedly, PPDB’s result in the April 2023 election (24.56 per cent) was worse than the sum of the separate results of PP and DB in the November 2021 and October 2022 elections.

More importantly, following the April 2023 election, PP and DB’s ulterior motives became clear. Contrary to what they promised in their election campaigns and public statements, PPDB made a shameful pact with Borissov’s GERB and Peevski’s DPS, which led to the election of Nikolay Denkov’s government in 2023.

Voter turnout and results of select parties in the last seven parliamentary elections

Source of data: Central Election Commission of Bulgaria

Note that parties and coalitions need to pass a four per cent threshold to enter parliament – results below

The shameful legacy of PPDB’s Faustian bargains with DPS and GERB in 2023

When explaining the nature of Denkov’s government to their voters, PPDB avoided using the word “coalition” like the plage, passionately arguing that Denkov’s cabinet was a “fit”, which was necessary to implement rule of law reforms. The “fit”, nevertheless, was not fit for purpose. Not only was Denkov’s government the incarnation of betrayal of the 2020 anti-corruption protests, which, in essence, were protests against GERB and DPS, but it also inflicted long-term damage to Bulgaria’s rule of law.

Beyond legitimizing the deep state, channelled by GERB and DPS, PPDB made a series of Faustian bargains with GERB and DPS, effectively helping them to capture even more institutions and to propel their autocracy. In 2023, PPDB, GERB and DPS carried out a controversial constitutional reform. One of its main goals was to limit the powers of the president in forming caretaker governments. This aspect of the reform was not motivated by principle – instead, it was clearly aimed against President Rumen Radev. Prior to this reform, in case parliament could not elect a cabinet, the president appointed a caretaker government and scheduled snap elections. Following this reform, however, the president can only select a caretaker prime minister from a predefined list – the President of the National Assembly, the Governor or Vice-Governor of the Bulgarian central bank, the President or Vice-President of the Court of Auditors, and the Ombudsman or his deputy.

In parallel, PPDB helped GERB and DPS elect personalities with close ties to GERB and DPS for many of these posts, increasing the chances of ensuring GERB and DPS-dominated caretaker governments in the next five years. In a twist of irony, in January 2026, PPDB publicly appealed to President Iotova to appoint as caretaker prime-minister the only person from their endorsed list who could not be suspected of links to Borissov or Peevski – the former head of the parliamentary group of PP Andrey Gurov. This only shows how displeased they were with the toxic cocktail for Bulgaria’s democracy, which they themselves helped concoct.

PPDB’s contributions to the assault on the rule of law are, sadly, not limited to the disfiguration of the constitution. The coalition helped GERB and DPS implement a “reform” of the Anti-Corruption Commission in autumn 2023, increasing its powers but not providing adequate checks and balances. What could go wrong? PP found out the hard way later when the monster it helped create launched politically motivated proceedings against the mayor of Varna who was elected on a PP ticket.

Unsurprisingly, support for PPDB shrunk to 14.33 per cent in the June 2024 snap election and 14.214 per cent in the October 2024 snap election – their loss of appeal to voters also meant that they were no longer of interest to the establishment itself. This opened the way for the election of Rosen Zhelyzkov’s government at the beginning of 2025 with the support of GERB, ITN, BSP and DPS.

Enter Rumen Radev: why now?

The political drama unfolding since the 2020 anti-corruption protests helps shed light on why Radev’s decision to actively join politics is timely and may be a game changer if he plays his cards wisely. Rumen Radev has won presidential elections twice, defeating GERB’s candidates at the second round in a country in which the president is directly elected by voters. At the second round in 2016, Radev was supported by 2,063,032 citizens, winning 59.37 per cent of the votes. At the second round in 2021, he gained 1,539,650 votes, equivalent to 66.72 per cent of the cast ballots. As his second term is about to draw to a close and as further reelection is not possible, Radev’s running for parliament seems like the next natural step from a political perspective.

It is also notable that one of the sparks of the 2020 anti-corruption protests was the raid on Radev’s own presidency, which was perceived as a coup against his institution orchestrated by GERB and DPS. Moreover, unlike the opposition, post-2020 Radev has managed to preserve his reputation. Polls from December 2025, before his resignation, showed that he was one of the few politicians with a net positive rating – he benefits from 54 per cent approval and 28 per cent disapproval. The significance of these numbers can be better appreciated in comparison with other prominent opposition figures. In the same poll, Kiril Petkov (PP) benefitted from ten per cent approval and 78 per cent disapproval.

One may hence suspect that many voters who want to see meaningful changes and who have been previously disappointed by opposition projects, such as PP and ITN, may be tempted to vote Radev.

What follows next?

Ultimately, Radev’s potential role in the future is a question, first and foremost, of mathematics – will he gain enough votes to form his own government after the April 2026 snap election, or will he have to strike deals with other political parties? While having a tarnished reputation in the eyes of critical voters, PPDB remains the only other relevant opposition force. Yet, in the past three years, beyond supporting the intuitu personae amendments to the constitution, which were clearly aimed against Radev, politicians from both DB and PP have propagated biased narratives about him. It is also obvious that PPDB are keeping the door open to negotiations with Borissov’s GERB. In other words, if Radev does not gain a solid majority in parliament, he will have to sit at the table with PPDB and disappoint his own voters who may not forgive this easily.

More importantly, what follows next is a matter of principles. This is where Radev’s own character may fail him. While an island of stability in an ocean of disappointing politicians, Radev is not known for bold political moves. He has, sadly, a history of brave public statements, which were not followed up by concrete actions. Were these choices informed by the nature of the presidential role or by his own personality? This is a pivotal question whose answer may determine the future of Bulgaria’s rule of law. The country is in dire need of profound legislative and institutional reforms which require character, expertise and integrity. We are yet to see if Radev and his team will rise to the occasion.

Dr. Radosveta Vassileva is a Bulgarian legal scholar whose research interests encompass EU law and comparative public and private law. She maintains a personal blog dedicated to the rule of law in Bulgaria. She is currently Adjunct Senior Research Fellow at UCD Sutherland School of Law.

Bulgaria, Bulgarian politics, Rumen Radev