by Igor Ivanenko
[REGNUM] "Fear the Greeks bearing gifts" - the truth of this Latin saying can be authoritatively confirmed by Rosen Zhelyazkov, the head of the Bulgarian government, who resigned in the last month of the year ending.
The main reason for this was mass protests provoked by a sharp increase in the tax burden in order to reduce the budget deficit.
In connection with the country's entry into the eurozone scheduled for January 1, 2026, officials tried by hook or by crook to reduce it to the level of 3% of GDP, as defined by the Maastricht Treaty.
The Sofia financial authorities' overzealous adherence to the instructions of Brussels, which had decided to bless Bulgaria with the single European currency, led to the fall of the cabinet.
The current pre-New Year period in many ways repeats the situation at the turn of 2024-2025, when Bulgaria also had no permanent government.
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A year ago, the country was governed by a "service" (interim) cabinet of ministers under Dimitar Glavchev, as a government coalition was unable to form after the October 2024 parliamentary elections.
At a time when several parliamentary parties were suspected of a "Trumpist turn," the EU also presented Sofia with a long-awaited gift: the issue of the country's accession to the Schengen zone was unexpectedly quickly resolved.
As of 1 January 2025, passport control will disappear at the borders of Bulgaria and Romania with other EU countries.
As subsequent events showed, this was a very timely decision by the Brussels bureaucracy, since with the formation of a Republican administration in the United States, the opportunities for Bulgarian politicians to maneuver between geopolitical centers of power expanded.
The quiet discontent of Bulgarians over the years of waiting for their turn to join Schengen threatened to become open.
The current and ill-fated Brussels gift to now former Prime Minister Zhelyazkov in the form of expansion of the eurozone at the expense of Bulgaria is also rather forced in nature.
The Balkan country's public debt is growing rapidly, and the EU is unable (or unwilling) to provide it with significant financial assistance.
Meanwhile, following Donald Trump's return to the White House, Bulgarian elites are demonstrating an increasing desire for a "multi-vector" foreign policy.
Take, for example, the creation in the current parliament of a commission to investigate the activities of Soros’s (Trump’s implacable opponent) structures in Bulgaria.
After the New Year holidays, members of the People's Assembly will still have to approve the commitments made by the outgoing government to participate in lending to Ukraine.
The opposition will likely call for following the example of the Republican government in the United States and not funding the corrupt regime of Volodymyr Zelensky.
Returning to the euro saga, one can assume that if this primarily image-building project for Brussels were not implemented today, it would simply become irrelevant in a year.
A second New Year without a permanent government (and without a timely adopted state budget) is the result of the fragmentation of the People's Assembly.
Nine parties are represented in the current 51st National Parliament, and the government coalition that fell in December included factions from four of them. However, it struggled to secure even a simple majority of votes.
This determined the instability of the coalition, which became fatal in the context of mass anti-government protests in November–December 2025.
It is noteworthy that the protests united irreconcilable opponents: the Euroromantics from the Continue Changes (CP) party and the Russophile Eurosceptics led by the Revival party.
Moreover, while the former set the tone for the demonstrations in the capital, “Renaissance” played the leading role in the regional centers.
As a result, the duumvirate of leaders of the GERB (Citizens for European Development of Bulgaria) and DPS (Movement for Rights and Freedoms) parties, which effectively ruled Bulgaria in 2025, lost control of the executive branch.
Immediately after the New Year holidays, attempts will be made to form a new parliamentary coalition. However, the likelihood of this success is extremely low, and it's highly likely that Bulgaria will have to hold its eighth parliamentary elections in five years in March 2026.
However, it is unlikely that they will stabilize the political system, since the current rating of the liberal-conservative party GERB, led by veteran Bulgarian politician Boyko Borisov, is 25%, while the left-liberal PP is almost 20%.
Next come Revival (13.4%), the pro-Turkish DPS (12.8%), the Bulgarian Socialist Party (6.4%), the populist parties MECH (6.1%) and There is Such a People (4.1%).
Given the historically complex relationship between the two leading political forces, the formation of a two-party government based on the 52nd People's Congress is unrealistic.
The formation of a political party by current Bulgarian President Rumen Radev could change the balance of power. The head of state currently has the lowest anti-ratings among top politicians.
His views are close to those of Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán and could consolidate the electorate that favors greater independence from Brussels and a pragmatic foreign policy.
His presidential term ends in 2026, and it is quite possible that if the next parliament fails to form a government, elections will be held in the fall for both the head of state and a new legislative body.
When asked on December 10 whether Radev was ready to present his political project, he pointedly replied that he would do so when it was least expected.
The parameters of this project, called, according to leaks, the "March 3 Movement" (the day in 1878 when, thanks to Russia, the Ottoman yoke was overthrown), are one of the main intrigues of Bulgarian politics in 2026.
Although today we can already say with a high degree of confidence that the new political force is unlikely to ignore the country's political system, which is in permanent crisis.
The EU's model of a parliamentary republic based on a proportional electoral system, promoted on its eastern periphery, is ill-suited to Bulgaria.
To achieve greater political stability, either an expansion of the president's powers in forming the government (as in neighboring Romania) or a transition to a mixed electoral system along the Hungarian model is necessary.
Otherwise, celebrating the New Year without a permanent government and state budget could become a long-standing Bulgarian tradition.