SOFIA (Bulgaria), December 2 (SeeNews) – GERB, the biggest party in Bulgaria's parliament, on Friday refused the president's offer to form the country's next government following last month's resignation of the GERB-led minority coalition cabinet.
Outgoing prime minister and GERB leader Boyko Borissov returned the exploratory mandate for the formation of a government handed to the party by president Rossen Plevneliev.
“I have no intention of proposing structure and composition of a government within the current parliament … so I am returning the mandate,” Borissov said a statement which he handed to Plevneliev during a meeting in the president's office televised live by public broadcaster BNT.
Plevneliev will now ask the second-biggest political party in parliament, the Socialists, to form the next government. However, Socialist leader Kornelia Ninova has said that the party will also decline the proposal.
“When the mandate is handed to me – we will return it,” Ninova said last month.
Should that happen, the president will ask another party in parliament - at his choice - to form government. It is expected that his choice would be either nationalist alliance comprising Patriotic Front coalition and Ataka party, right-wing Reformist Bloc (RB), the junior partner of GERB in the outgoing government.
If the third political party rejects the offer, or fails to form government within the current parliament, the president has to appoint a caretaker cabinet and call early elections.