Pollster Mira Radeva of the MBMD agency has blamed the media for the recent scandal revolving around results published by her company last week.

The results gave a huge lead to the centrist Citizens for European Development of Bulgaria party, GERB, against the left-wing Bulgarian Socialist Party, BSP.

Radeva, Director of the Institute for Sociology and Marketing, MBMD, accused the Pressa (Press) daily in leaking the results in order to be the first one to break the sensational news.

"I would not comment why my colleagues reacted in such manner and why we must be wary of journalists. I don't deny having disclosed before several people these results and I did expect the scandal. I wanted to wait a little to consult with other experts, but Pressa rushed with the publication," she said.

According to the said poll, if the general elections were to be held now, GERB would receive 30% of the vote, while BSP would have 16%.

This is in stark discrepancy with other recent polls of a number of Bulgarian sociology agencies, showing the two major parties are running neck to neck. It prompted nearly all other Bulgarian pollsters to unite against MBMD.

Radeva says her data has been confirmed by two independent polls, which MBMD has conducted on the order of "an American Foundation with the US Embassy in Sofia being aware of it and a team of French pollsters," but continues to refuse to name them.

The US Embassy stated they have requested a poll which did not include questions on Bulgarians' voting inclinations. The diplomatic mission further explained the US orders polls across the globe, but they focus on questions that would paint a better picture about bilateral partnership.

Meanwhile, the Pressa Editor-in-Chief, Tosho Toshev, stressed until now Radeva had not denied the data they published, and even confirmed it on the day it was released.

"We are a newspaper; we learn something and if we deem it interesting, we publish it," Toshev is quoted saying.

On Tuesday, Radeva officially announced the results from the controversial poll as 30.1% for GERB and 15.6% for BSP.

The poll has been conducted among 800 respondents of voting age between March 16 and 19.

On February 21, Bulgaria's Parliament approved the resignation of Prime Minister Boyko Borisov's GERB government amidst unprecedented since 1997 protest rallies against sky-high utility bills, monopolies, stagnation, corruption and wide-spread poverty, which later turned into a civil unrest and political demands.

Snap general election is to be held May 12, just two months ahead of the regular date in July.

President, Rosen Plevneliev, named the caretaker government on March 12.

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