Addressing reporters on election night on November 15, Prime Minister Boiko Borissov, perhaps only half-joking, said "if we could have done so, we would have avoided spending anything at all on the Sofia mayor elections and appointed Yordanka Fandukova straight away".

Indeed, hardly anyone was surprised to see Fandukova win the election after Borissov placed his trust in her. Even her main opponent, Georgi Kadiev, from the Bulgarian Socialist Party (BSP), admitted that winning the elections did not figure on his agenda. Kadiev was merely fighting to keep the party together after the BSP’s devastating loss to Borissov’s Citizens for the European Development of Bulgaria (GERB) at July’s Parliamentary elections. 

Borissov’s landslide victory and high approval rating ever since prompted the other mainstream parties to withhold their own candidatures and support Fandukova against Kadiev.

As much as they could apply to the hustings, Borissov’s words could also foreshadow the nature of Fandukova’s rule. One of the main accusations against her during the campaign was not about her programme, experience or priorities, but whether she would be Borissov’s shadow in the city hall, a mere puppet manipulated from the Cabinet building down the road. 

It is a tough situation for Fandukova who, according to her own statements and political biography, owes everything to Borissov. It was Borissov who made her deputy Sofia mayor for education when, as a headmistress of a Sofia school, few had heard of her. He then made her Education Minister when few outside Sofia knew of her. And it was Borissov who nominated her for the post of Sofia mayor (although both claim that Fandukova’s nomination came from GERB members, not Borissov).

Continuity
Consider that your party’s leader was the former mayor and you succeed him to that very post. It’s only logical to vow to continue his programme. This is exactly what Fandukova did on November 15. She said her first move would be to draft the city hall budget for 2010 and prepare the city’s infrastructure for the winter.

Another priority, she said, was drafting a special new law on Sofia which has been Borissov’s favourite preoccupation over the past four years, as well as building Sofia’s refuse processing plant. 

On another of Borissov’s pet projects, opening new kindergartens, Fandukova pledged to maintain progress. She also promised to deal with the city’s stray dogs after ordering a detailed report on the problem. She vowed to adopt the same approach to tackling Roma ghettos and their extremely low living standards. 

Regarding people registering their home address in the capital so that they pay taxes in Sofia, Fandukova said she supported this and promised not to raise local taxes during economic crisis. All these goals had been priorities of Borissov and his city hall administration, including Fandukova. So when she inherited the mantle on November 15 she saw no reason to change them. 

"We have had no disagreements with the Prime Minster up until now. I am a team player and when I have a goal I find arguments and fight for them. I will always answer the Prime Minister’s phone calls and I will always be ready to call him whenever there’s a need," she said.