In a special address to the nation, President Rumen Radev announced he was setting the date for parliamentary elections in the country on 4 April, 2021.This is one week after the earliest possible date after the expiry of the term of office of the current parliament, the Bulgarian head of state said.

The President thanked everyone who responded to his invitation for consultations on the measures that need to be taken during the upcoming election.

“The need has arisen to make changes to the Election Code. I expect the legislator to consider and vote for other, no less important proposals, such as postal voting by Bulgarians abroad who are going to find it very difficult or even impossible to exercise their constitutional right to vote in many countries, video surveillance at polling stations and streaming of the process of ballot counting and the processing of the tally sheets, as well as fair access to the media for all for the duration of the election campaigning, elimination of ballot counting by hand from the machine vote,” President Radev stated.

“There is universal consensus that the authorities in charge need to declare, as early as possible, clear health measures which are crucial to the election campaigning, to recruiting members of the election commissions and to voter turnout,” Rumen Radev stated further.

The Bulgarian President added that he expects the Central Election Commission to bring electoral registers up to date.