Gerb

Yordanka Fandakova, acting mayor of Sofia and nominee of the ruling GERB party, won the second round of local elections in the Bulgarian capital against the protest candidate and former ombudsperson Maya Manolova on Sunday.

Yesterday elections were hed in 22 districts of Sofia. Only Bankya and Kremikovtsi elected mayors last Sunday. In Bankya Rangel Markov from GERB won the first round, and in "Kremikovtsi" the independent candidate Lilia Donkova became the district mayor.

The current mayor of Pleven, Georg Spartanski, won another term. Today, he collected 53.1% of the votes of his fellow citizens, according to the exit poll data of Alpha Research, reported by BNT. His rival and current Pleven district governor Miroslav Petrov of GERB received 43.8 percent of the votes.

GERB's candidate for mayor of Blagoevgrad and former mayor Atanas Kambitov lost the run-off. He gained 43% of the votes today, according to Gallup. The new mayor of the city is Rumen Tomov, who was an independent candidate and was elected by 52.1 percent of those who went to the polling stations today.

BSP candidate for mayor of Ruse Pencho Milkov wins the run-off in the regional city. The nominee from the Left collects 57.5% of the votes in the second round. GERB candidate Diana Ivanova received 37.6% of the votes, according to the exit poll of Trend agency, commissioned by Nova TV.

Yordanka Fandakova wins a new term as mayor of Sofia. This is indicated by the first forecast results of today's run-off. In the second round, GERB's candidate received 50.09% of the vote, while rival Maya Manolova received the vote of 42% of the city's citizens, according to a poll by Gallup commissioned by Nova TV.

Control of 19 out of 28 regional cities in Bulgaria will be contested in the second round of local elections held on 3 November, though experts predict little drama and a repeat - albeit less decisive - victory for the ruling GERB party of Prime Minister Boyko Borsissov, compared to its record 2015 local elections result.

The CEC published the results of the first-round local elections in the country with 100% tally sheets processed.

There are still protocols in Sofia and Shumen:

The CEC began exporting the first data from the processing of election protocols. Here's what the data shows at 11:20.

In Sofia - with 44.49% of protocols counted - Yordanka Fandakova has 36.57% ahead of Maya Manolova, which has 27.30%. There will be a runoff in Sofia next week.

There will be a second round in Sofia and a number of regional cities. GERB remains the strongest party, the BSP improves its results and goes on a run-off in a number of regional cities. The big surprise of the vote is the breakthrough of the independent candidate Boris Bonev in Sofia. At the same time, Bulgaria rejected national populists.