Boyko Borisov

Borisov has claimed that his grandfather was executed by the communists for being a Nikola Petkov supporter in the wake of the Bulgarian coup d'état of 1944.

This has been disputed, however, as Nikola Petkov was still an ally of the communist insurgents in 1944.

Furthermore, Borisov's later rise within the ranks of communist-era security services would have been unlikely with such family background.

Boyko Metodiev Borisov (Бойко Методиев Борисов, ; born 13 June 1959) is a Bulgarian politician who was a three-term Prime Minister of Bulgaria, serving from 2009 to 2013, 2014 to 2017, and 2017 to 2021, making him Bulgaria's second-longest serving Prime Minister to date.

Despite leaving office, Borisov remained as the leader of the GERB party and later returned to politics by becoming a member of the National Assembly, which he is to this date.

Borisov was born in 1959 in Bankya (then a village, today a town, part of Stolichna Municipality) to the Ministry of Internal Affairs official Metodi Borisov and elementary school teacher Veneta Borisova.

Other sources point that Borisov's grandfather either died during a criminal incident, or that both his grandfathers died peacefully in the 1960s and 1970s.

In 1977, Borisov graduated from Bankya's high school with excellent grades.

Borisov has been claiming participation in karate championships since 1978, serving as the coach of the Bulgarian national team and a referee of international matches.

He said to United States President Barack Obama that he has a 7th dan black belt in karate, but his coach denied this, and stated that Borisov has never been even a karate competitor, but only an administrator of the team.

Borisov is divorced, but for a number of years lived with Tsvetelina Borislavova, head of Bulgarian American Credit Bank.

Borisov has a daughter, Veneta, from his former marriage to the physician Stela.

Borisov also has a sister, Krasimira Ivanova.

As a National Security Office member, Borisov took part in the protection of crops and haylofts during the name-changing campaign towards ethnic Turks in the 1980s.

Between 1982 and 1990, he assumed different positions in the Ministry of Internal Affairs as a firefighter and later as a professor at the Police Academy in Sofia.

From 1985 to 1990, Borisov was a lecturer at the Higher Institute for Police Officers Training and Scientific Research of the Ministry of Interior.

He subsequently became bodyguard to Bulgaria's last communist leader, Todor Zhivkov, after the latter was overthrown in 1989, and to Simeon II.

Borisov quit the Ministry in 1991 with the rank of major, after formally refusing to renounce his Communist Party membership, or "depoliticise".

In 1991, he founded a private security company, Ipon-1.

Boyko Borisov was the Chief Secretary of the Bulgarian Ministry of Interior between 2001 and 2005, with the rank of General.

During that period, he became famous for getting the notorious mobster Sreten Jocić apprehended.

Borisov was elected Mayor of Sofia in 2005.

In December 2005, he was the founding chairman of the conservative political party Citizens for European Development of Bulgaria (GERB), becoming its lead candidate in the 2009 general election.

In the 2005 parliamentary elections he was a parliamentary candidate of the National Movement Simeon II; he was elected in two regions but decided to retain his job as Chief Secretary of the Ministry.

Later in 2005, he resigned from that post, instead of standing as a candidate in the mayoral election in Sofia.

He was elected as Mayor and succeeded Stefan Sofiyanski.

He was re-elected in the 2007 election.

Borisov led GERB to a landslide victory in 2009, defeating the incumbent Socialist Party, and resigned as mayor of Sofia to be sworn in as prime minister.

Borisov's party GERB also won the parliamentary election on 5 July 2009 by collecting 39.72% of the popular vote and 117 of the 240 seats in parliament.

Since 27 July 2009 Borisov served as Prime Minister of Bulgaria in a GERB-dominated centre-right minority government with parliamentary support from three other parliamentary groups, including the nationalist party Ataka.

He resigned in 2013, after nationwide protests against the government's energy policy, but after leading GERB to victory in the 2014 general election, he became prime minister again.

Electoral results for Borisov and his party were overshadowed by allegations of fraud in 2013, 2015, and in 2019 both locally and for the European Parliament.

In 2013, Borisov became the oldest person ever to play for a Bulgarian professional club when he appeared for FC Vitosha Bistritsa in the B Group, the second division of Bulgarian football.

His second term ended similarly to his first, after Borisov resigned in January 2017, this time following GERB's defeat in the 2016 presidential election.

As before, Borisov led GERB to election victory again in the snap 2017 general election, becoming prime minister for a third time.

Under Borisov's cabinets Bulgaria saw improved macroeconomic stability and political stability while remaining the EU's poorest member, with nearly a quarter of its population below national poverty lines.

Foreign direct investment fell and corruption have led as recently as June 2019 to repeated rejection of Bulgaria's attempts to join the Schengen Area.

Judicial threats and attacks against journalists increased to the point where journalism in Bulgaria became "dangerous" according to Reporters Without Borders, which ranked Bulgaria 111th globally in press freedom in 2019.

Former U.S. ambassador to Bulgaria James Pardew said in 2019 that a "national political environment with little government or criminal accountability and no serious opposition to challenge the current government" was in place as a result of collusion, corruption and stifling of the media under Borisov.

On 17 March 2022, Borisov was detained after allegations of misuse of EU funds, he was released after spending 24 hours in prison.