Vasil Ivanov has been elected the new head of the Bulgarian Socialist Party (BSP) in Burgas province, taking over from former MP Todor Baychev, the party said. Ivanov was previously a municipal councillor.

Party members voted at a provincial council meeting last night at BSP headquarters on Ferdinandova Street. Ivanov beat rival candidate Nikolay Tishev, head of the BSP's Burgas municipal branch, who fell short of the support he had expected.

"I take this post not as a privilege but as a duty and a personal responsibility," Ivanov said. He promised that, with the backing of those present, he would do everything he could to restore the party's standing and rebuild trust in it.

Ivanov, 37, is from Burgas and has years of organisational and political experience with the BSP. He has served as organisational secretary of the Burgas branch, worked as a municipal councillor, led the party's youth wing in the province, and earlier chaired the Student Council at Burgas Free University.

At the same meeting, the council also signed off on a new Executive Bureau. Three people were elected deputy chairs: Atanas Marinov, a municipal councillor in Aytos who heads the local BSP branch there; Iva Kuseva, a municipal councillor and BSP chair in Pomorie; and Yani Yanulov, director of Nessebar's municipal port and chair of the BSP there.

Other bureau members are Yona Chobanova, deputy mayor of Sredets and chair of the local BSP branch; Yordan Petkov, head of the "Culture, Tourism and Economic Activities" department at Sozopol municipality and chair of the BSP in Sozopol; Pomorie municipal councillor Nikolay Bukovinov; and former MP Nikolay Tishev. BSP deputy chairman Atanas Merdzhanov also attended.

Ivanov now has to rebuild the party's structures across the province. In April's election, BSP support in Karnobat — long a Socialist stronghold — fell to just 3%, and stayed under 5% in Sozopol.