Campaign ads: Candidates book nearly €380,000 – Iotova spends the most
According to an IRPS study, presidential candidates had booked advertising worth €378,035 in 39 media outlets by Oct. 14. Biggest earners: TV Evrokom and BNT.
Graphic: TERRA WORLD NEWS (own graphic based on the sources listed)
In the presidential election campaign, political advertising worth €378,035 had been contracted in 39 national and regional media outlets by Oct. 14. That is according to the second study by the Institute for Development of Public Environment (IRPS), published by the Open Parliament platform. That is about €116,000 more than after the first ten days of the campaign, when around €262,000 had been recorded. The election is on Oct. 25; 27 candidate pairs are on the ballot.
Leading is the duo Iliana Iotova – Kiril Valchev with €94,496. They are followed by Kostadin Kostadinov – Petar Volgin with €70,510, Andrey Gyurov – Georgi Kandev with €45,633 (after €9,824 in the first ten days), Ivan Hristanov – Stoyanka Cherkezova with €41,832, and Boyan Rasate – Yordan Manasiev with €20,000. The five biggest advertisers thus account for about 72 percent of all spending.
Among media outlets, TV Evrokom leads with €94,048, ahead of public broadcaster BNT with €81,081, dir.bg (€40,025), the newspaper 24 Chasa (€30,867) and actualno.com (€22,953). In addition, the Central Election Commission funds media packages: €438,412 of these had been used by Oct. 13. IRPS stressed that disclosure of the contracts is important for verifying that candidates have equal access to the public.