President Rumen Radev met with representatives of the parliamentary group of the "BSP for Bulgaria" in the course of the consultations with the parliamentary forces in the 48th National Assembly, before handing over the first exploratory mandate to form a government.

At the beginning of the meeting, the Head of State stressed that there are many urgent tasks ahead of this parliament, but the most important one is to form a regular government that will take responsibility for the governance of the country. 

The Bulgarian Socialist Party (BSP) is a party with long traditions and experience in parliamentarism and in governing Bulgaria and can be very useful in this difficult social and political situation, the President said. They discussed the potential for dialogue between the parties to form a government within this parliament, as well as whether and under what conditions the left will support the political forces that will receive a mandate. Ninova again said that the BSP would not support a GERB-UDF mandate. Kornelia Ninova added that she would negotiate with "We Continue the Change", as she sees more points of contact with them, related to social policy.

The BSP leader commented that the actual meetings for the formation of a cabinet will start only after the first mandate is handed, so she urged this to happen as soon as possible. The president and Ninova had different positions on fiscal policy, with the president supporting the idea that the 2022 budget be extended. According to Ninova, the social policy envisaged in the budget cannot be extended in 2023 against the backdrop of rising inflation.