Pro-Russian Bulgarian party showing signs of crisis ahead of EU elections

Bulgaria’s largest far-right and pro-Russian party, Vazrazhdane, is showing signs of crisis ahead of June’s EU elections, as evidenced by a drop in the polls and recent exits, including that of one of the party’s most prominent figures.

Support for Vazrazhdane has fallen to 9.9%, according to the latest poll published on Friday by the Market Links polling agency – quite a drop from the 14.3% it received in the last parliamentary elections in 2023 when it was the third largest political force.

On the same day the poll was published, three of Vazrazhdane’s 36 MPs in parliament were expelled from the party over internal scandals.

The expulsion of Nikolai Drenchev, one of the party’s best-known figures, was a surprise, as he became famous for saying that Vazrazhdane leader Kostadin Kostadinov “never makes mistakes”.

At the end of last year, Vazrazhdane made no secret of its ambitions to become the second political force to send at least four of Bulgaria’s 17 MEPs to the European Parliament.

Kostadinov even attended the congress of Germany’s far-right AfD party in July last year, where he announced his party’s common goals with the AfD.

But the prospects for the EU house now seem bleak.

“The reason why this type of party in Bulgaria has been constantly falling apart over the years is that there is no ideology behind the party’s patriotism, only trade. A noble cause – the protection of some patriotic values – is used to extract some material dividends,” political scientist Georgi Kiryakov told Euractiv in an interview.

The political scientist recalls the decline of the Ataka party, led by the far-right pro-Russian politician Volen Siderov, which had a strong position in Bulgarian politics a decade ago, while in the last parliamentary elections, it participated in a coalition and won 0.4% of the vote.

“With its flashy rhetoric, there is a high probability Vazrazhdane will follow the fate of Ataka – or that it will gradually disappear from the political scene unless it is replaced by another similar party,” Kiryakov added.

He predicted that Vazrazhdane would perform poorly in the EU elections and eventually reach a situation where it would be forced to support the larger mainstream parties in return for undisclosed benefits.

“On the Bulgarian political scene, these politicians, who brand themselves as far-right populists, have never achieved unity. Kostadin Kostadinov himself, who now leads Vazrazhdane, left another such party – VMRO. Voters will be demotivated by the events in Vazrazhdane, although they associate it as the only pro-Russian party that is an alternative to the Euro-Atlantic project in Bulgaria,” political scientist Ivo Indjov told Euractiv.

At the same time, Vazrazhdane is currently trying to mobilise its voters for the EU elections with protests and border blockades over the rejected proposal to hold a referendum on adopting the euro in Bulgaria.

As well as opposing Bulgaria’s entry into the eurozone, Vazazhdane has promised his supporters to work for the country’s withdrawal from NATO, but has no clear position on the EU and defends the Russian narrative on the war in Ukraine.

(Krassen Nikolov | Euractiv.bg)