At its regular meeting today, the Council of Ministers officially approved the budget plan required for the upcoming presidential and vice-presidential elections in the Republic of Bulgaria, which will take place on October 25, 2026. The total approved budget for the preparation and full execution of the vote amounts to over 116.9 million euros.
The government press office provided an important clarification, noting that the cabinet is prepared to allocate additional funds if the need arises. Such additional resources would be utilized in cases where the Central Election Commission (CEC) enters into contracts for:
- logistics and maintenance of the technical condition of the specialized electronic machine voting devices;
- delivery of supplies and materials, as well as the implementation of related activities directly associated with machine voting;
- creation of a specialized unit to manage the machine voting process;
- organization of paper ballot voting, the subsequent computer processing of voting data, and the issuance of a bulletin with the final results of the election process.
The Chairman of the CEC, Georgi Horozov, commented on the allocated funds, emphasizing that they represent an estimated value and it is not mandatory for the entire sum to be spent. He explained that a slight increase in the remuneration of election commission members is necessary due to the larger number of polling stations outside the country's borders, but he firmly clarified that this does not drastically change the expenditure side. Regarding technical readiness, Horozov stated that the printing house of the Bulgarian National Bank (BNB) has provided assurances that it possesses the necessary technology to ensure the machine voting paper fully complies with all legal requirements. The public procurement tender announced yesterday will allow the devices to be repaired and inspected in a timely manner to ensure they operate correctly on October 25.
The topic of transparency and accessibility of the vote was central during a meeting between the Minister of Innovation and Digital Transformation, Ivan Vasilev, and representatives of the CEC. A key focus of the discussions was the upgrading of the mobile application for members of the section commissions, which will be expanded with new functionality for citizens. "The machines will be accessible to citizens before election day as well through an upgrade to the existing mobile application," Minister Vasilev stated after the meeting. The new software tool will offer a voting simulation, through which every user will be able to familiarize themselves with the appearance of the ballot and the steps in the process itself, with the project being implemented based on an idea from the new composition of the CEC.
Minister Vasilev added that as the coordinator on behalf of the Council of Ministers, his main task is for the process to be as open as possible. He committed to ensuring that citizens, the media, and representatives of the non-governmental sector have access to:
- the source code used to certify the voting machines;
- the official protocols proving the technical integrity of the devices;
- the process of entering election results through the presence of observers.
The legal framework for the vote was laid back in July, when Parliament officially set the date for October 25, and the decision was duly published in the "State Gazette". Subsequently, on August 13, the CEC adopted the timeline for the presidential elections, and this past week, the Council of Ministers officially adopted the decision regarding the preparation and conduct of the upcoming vote.