President Georgi Purvanov will ask Parliament to call a referendum on changing the electoralal system if political parties fail to hear his demands, Purvanov told right-wing politicians on June 30 2008, the presidency said in a statement.

Purvanov wants Parliament to amend the electoral system by introducing a stronger element of majoritarian elections within a mixed electoral system and changes in the political parties' financing.

Among Purvanov's ideas, published on the presidency website, feature proposals for introducing strict criteria for parties that would be allowed to take part in elections. That would include having branches in at least two thirds of all Bulgarian municipalities, and election results of at least one per cent from the previous two consecutive elections.

If parties fail to achieve this threshold, they would be erased from the party register and will have to register again, Purvanov suggested.

Other ideas included setting up if a public register for parties' financing with only individuals allowed to donate funds to parties. As a compensation, Purvanov wants the state subsidy for parties that have won seats in Parliament to be raised.

Purvanov first talked about his ideas after the local elections in October 2007, which saw TV reports about numerouse cases of vote-buying. Since then, he has been repeating his ideas in various meetings and events. In early June, he received the formal support of Prime Minister Sergei Stanishev for the changes to happen this fall, less than a year before the next general elections for Parliament.

On June 28 the senior partner in the ruling coalition, the Bulgarian Socialist Party, which Purvanov chaired before becoming a president in 2001, also stated its support for part of Purvanov's ideas, such as the public register and the increase of the state subsidies.

So far, the other two parties in the ruling coalition - the National Movement for Stability and Progress and the Movement for Rights and Freedoms - have not come forward with official stands on the issue.

This might be a problem for Purvanov, because according to the constitution, the President can only ask Parliament to call a referendum, but in the end it is up to the MPs to decide on it.

With the exception of a few locally-held referendums, such as the one in Bourgas on the Bourgas-Alexandropoulis oil pipeline in February, Bulgaria has not held a single nation-wide plebiscite.

If Parliament agrees on the referendum, it could be held in October or November, Maria Kapon, one of the right-wing politicians who met Purvanov on June 30, told reporters. For this to happen, Parliament should review Purvanov's request in July.

Bulgaria’s is currently using a proportional electoral system which aims at a close match between the percentage of votes that groups of candidates (grouped by a party in most cases) obtain in elections and the percentage of seats they receive.