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Voter turnout continues lower compared to previous parliamentary election

| updated on 4/4/21 7:16 PM

By 5 PM voter turnout reached 38.2%, Gallup reports for the BNR. This continues to be around 4% lower than the voter turnout during the previous parliamentary elections.

Voter turnout at the parliamentary elections by 3 PM was a little over 30%, reports Gallup, the agency the BNR is working with during the election. Sociologist Svetlin Tachev added, for BNR’s Horizont channel, that this is 4% lower than voter turnout at the elections in 2017. 

Voter turnout by 1 PM was around 22%, according to exit poll data by Gallup International. In comparison, at the same hour during the 2017 elections voter turnout was over 25%, Yanitsa Petkova from Gallup International said for the BNR. She added that for now, more people from the active-age bracket have been casting their votes, most of all those aged over 30. “The 30 to 50 year-olds are the people who have been voting most actively. Young people most often vote in the afternoon,” she said.

Yanitsa Petkova urged people to be active when approached for the exit poll, because it is “the only chance of obtaining election results as early as tonight.”

“We know that the Central Election Commission is going to count slowly. This time the tally sheets are very complicated,” Yanitsa Petkova said for BNR's Horizont channel.

Nationwide voter turnout by 12 AM was 18.9%, the Central Election Commission reported, as quoted by the Bulgarian National Radio. Nationwide voter turnout by 10 AM was 7.6%. Voter turnout was 0.8% lower compared to 10 AM during the previous elections for parliament in 2017.

Turnout at 10 AM was lowest in Silistra - 4% , and highest in Montana and Vratsa at 11%.

There will be no extension of election day - it ends at 20:00. If there are voters in front of the sections, the voting continues not later than 9 p.m. The news was reported by spokespersons of the Central Election Commission.



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