The biggest change brought by Bulgaria's 2009 parliamentary elections was that so many people decided to vote, political scientist Ivan Krastev told The Sofia Echo in an interview at the election centre after polls closed on July 5 2009.

The other major change was that before the elections, the popular notion was that Bulgarians were so disgusted with politics that they did not believe in elections, but these elections showed that this was not the case.

"For me, the biggest loser, and I am very happy about it, is the idea of using dirty political games, that people can be fooled."

The result of this was that the Bulgarian Socialist Party had lost, as had Ahmed Dogan's Movement for Rights and Freedoms.

People had turned out to vote against Dogan's party, not because they did not want Turks in government, but because they would not allow the thinking that a political force could not be sanctioned by voters.

Voters had punished Dogan's arrogance in believing that "no matter what, Bulgarian government cannot happen without us".

The biggest challenge that Boiko Borissov's GERB now faced was the integration of the Muslim community.

As to GERB, Krastev said, given the election results it would be illogical if Borissov was not Prime Minister. But it was up to Borissov to make this decision, he said.

A coalition between GERB and the Blue Coalition would be a stable one for one simple reason - the Blue Coalition has no one else with whom they could possibly serve in coalition, Krastev said.

Of Simeon Saxe-Coburg's party, which most polls give no chance of a seat in Parliament, Krastev said that the National Movement for Stability and Progress could not continue outside Parliament as a political force.

The people who founded the NMSP came from professions outside Parliament and it would make sense for them to return to those professions, because the party had no future as an extra-parliamentary force, Krastev said.