December 5 (SeeNews) - Bulgaria’s centre-right GERB-UDF coalition, the largest political formation in parliament after October's early elections, nominated neurosurgeon Nikolay Gabrovski as prime minister on Monday, after receiving from president Rumen Radev a mandate to form a cabinet.
The coalition has seven days to nominate a cabinet, which needs to be voted in parliament. The GERB-UDF coalition, however, has only 67 MPs in the 240-seat National Assembly.
Accepting the nomination, Gabrovski said that given the multiple crises Bulgaria is currently facing - economic, social, political and migrant-related, he will make the utmost effort to propose a cabinet that would be removed as far as possible from political confrontation while leaning mostly on apolitical expertise to help the country overcome these challenges.
During the ceremony, which was broadcast live by public television BNT, the president expressed hope that the extended period of consultations has allowed GERB-UDF to reach the level of political support necessary to fulfill the mandate.
The president handed the first exploratory mandate after conducting several weeks of consultations with all six parties and political formations that crossed the 4% threshold for parliamentary representation.
Under the country's constitution, if the first exploratory mandate is returned unsuccessfully, the president must ask We Continue the Change (WCC), the party with the second-largest parliamentary group of 53 MPs, to try to put together a new cabinet. WCC which will again have seven days to propose a government.
In the last resort, the president will pass the mandate to a third political formation of his choice. If it is also unsuccessful in proposing a government or obtaining majority parliamentary backing for one, the president will call snap general elections. Those are likely to be held in March, local media has quoted Radev as saying.