Poll Forecasts Bulgaria's Presidential Elections as Close Call

There will be a certain runoff in the October 23 presidential elections in Bulgaria and a very close call among the top contenders, according to a recent poll of the Alfa Research Agency.

The poll has been conducted among 1 021 voters between October 15 and October 19, 2011.

The election campaign had failed to consolidate strong support for the ruling center-right Citizens for European Development of Bulgaria, GERB, party and to mobilize a significant "protest" vote.

About 58% of the voters (3.5 million people) will go to the polls and this voter activity will lead to a very close result for Bulgaria's former Minister of Regional Development and Public Works, Rosen Plevneliev, who is nominated by GERB, and the candidate of the opposition Bulgarian Socialist party, BSP, Ivaylo Kalfin - a former Foreign Affairs Minister in the Socialist-led Three-Way Coalition cabinet and a current Member of the European Parliament - the difference between the two is down to 9%, compared to 15% at the beginning of the campaign.

At the beginning of the campaign, Plevneliev and his running mate - Justice Minister on leave, Margarita Popova, had an estimated 22%-25% of the vote and currently they have between 37% and 40%.

Kalfin and his mate - former Culture Minister from the BSP quota and movie star, Stefan Danailov have increased their support by 13% - from 16.4% to 27%-29%, which is explained by strong consolidation of the Socialists and 36% of the vote of the ethnic Turkish Movement for Rights and Freedoms, DPS.

The poll portrays a very interesting picture of the latter - not only one third of DPS vote is - going to BSP, but another 9% say they support the independent presidential candidate, formerly from the party of ex King and Prime Minister, Simeon Saxe-Coburg, National Movement for Stability and Prosperity, NMSP, Meglena Kuneva, and 9% will vote for DPS dissident Kassim Dal - the strongest political opponent of their leader, Ahmed Dogan. These percentages are the first ever sign in the last 20 years that there is a split among DPS voters.

Beyond the top three, the largest potential is given to the leader of the far-right, nationalist Ataka party, Volen Siderov, and his vice presidential nomination, Pavel Shopov - they have the support of about 3.8% of the voters, but a very high party voter mobilization - 83%, which gives them the chance to have 6%-6.5% of the ballots cast for them on election day.

2.2% say they will vote for the nomination of the right-wing Blue Coalition, Rumen Hristov, but due to hesitation of the right-wing voters, he will get about 3.9% of the ballots.

In the forecasted situation of a very close call between the top contenders, voter activity will be key and a higher one would give a lead to the nomination of the ruling GERB - nearly 40% of the ballots; low activity can shrink the distance between GERB and BSP to 6%-7%.

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