Home POLITICS Kiril Petkov facing multiple challenges as Bulgaria’s new Prime Minister

Kiril Petkov facing multiple challenges as Bulgaria’s new Prime Minister

by asma

Kiril Petkov, a Harvard-educated entrepreneur, has been appointed prime minister of Bulgaria, and has approved the lineup of his broad coalition government, ending months of political deadlock in the European Union’s poorest member state, Reuters reports.

Petkov, 41, whose new centrist faction We Continue The Change (PP) won Bulgaria’s third national election this year in November, secured a clear majority of 134 votes in the 240-member parliament to take over the reins of the Balkan country.

He will lead an unprecedented ruling coalition with the leftist Socialists, anti-establishment ITN party and the centre-right Democratic Bulgaria, united under the motto “zero tolerance to corruption”, for a four-year term.

“I will insist that corruption from the lowest to the highest level be exposed,” Petkov told the chamber prior to his election, appealing to all lawmakers to support legal changes needed to overhaul the judiciary.

The new government takes over following eight months of political impasse and two interim administrations after anger against high-level graft ended the decade-long rule of former centre-right premier Boyko Borissov.

Petkov, who served briefly as Minister of the Interior, will head a four-party alliance of Borissov’s political foes with a vow to clean up public life, speed growth to over 5% a year and catch up faster with richer Western peers, whilst facing challenges ranging from high energy costs and low COVID vaccination rates to preparing the economy for euro zone entry in 2024.

“My first task will be to keep the electricity costs for consumers at bay and boost the level of vaccinations at least to the average level in the EU,” Petkov told reporters.

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