Local elections in Bulgaria were held on 29 October 2023.[1] Mayors and municipal councillors across the country were elected.[2]
The elections to Bulgaria's municipal councils are conducted via proportional representation with an open list preferential voting system.
The mayoral elections take place within the context of a majoritarian two-round system. The first round of the elections will be held on 29 October. If no candidate in a given constituency manages to gain 50% of the vote, a runoff election will be held for that constituency in the second round on 5 November.[3]
Voting is officially mandatory, but in practice there is no punishment for failing to vote and the law itself isn't strictly enforced.[4]
Voters further have the option to vote against all proposed candidates.[5]
The election for the position of Mayor of Sofia, Bulgaria's capital and largest city, is expected to be hotly contested and will result in a new mayor being elected, as incumbent mayor Yordanka Fandakova from GERB has announced she will not seek re-election.
Opinion polls for Mayor of Sofia
According to Central Election Commission the number of people who voted on 29 October totaled 2,713,979 or 44.94% of eligible voters. The turnout was 49.76% in the 2019 local elections. The invalid ballots in the 29 October, 2023 elections totaled over half a million, including 412,711 ballots for municipal councilors, 94,195 for municipality mayor (down from 128,204 in 2019) and 34,235 for mayoralty mayor.[6]
In general, GERB had the strongest showing throughout the country, although the party failed to make it to the second round in the capital.[7]
Overall, GERB won 11 regional towns, PP–DB won four, and the Bulgarian Socialist party won three. Of the largest four cities, PP-DB won in the capital (Sofia) and Varna while GERB won in Plovdiv and Burgas.[8]
