[A large poster showing Bulgaria's former
          King Simeon II. Read photo caption below.]

Bulgarians go to polls, ex-king tipped for victory

SOFIA, June 17 (AFP) -
Bulgaria's 6.4 million voters go to the polls Sunday for legislative elections expected to return former child king Simeon II to power, 55 years after he fled into exile after World War II.

Opinion polls indicate the 63-year-old former king's National Movement Simeon II coalition is set to win some 40 percent of the vote, well ahead of the centre-right United Democratic Forces (UDF) of outgoing Prime Minister Ivan Kostov which has imposed four years of painful economic belt-tightening.

If the polls are confirmed, Simeon II would be the first region's first former monarch to return to power in his homeland since the collapse of communism in 1989.

The ballots will elect 240 deputies to the single-chamber parliament, from a total of 5,000 candidates from 36 parties.

Born into the royal house of Saxe-Coburg and related to Britain's Queen Elizabeth II, the bearded ex-monarch has spent most of his life as a succesful businessman in Spain.

Simeon's National Movement (MNS II) was only founded in April after he registered his candidates on the electoral tickets of two obscure but official parties, forming a legitimate coalition.

He has promised to revive his impoverished country's fortunes within 800 days if he wins the election.

His promises, including interest-free loans for small businesses and wage increases for police and teachers, have been slammed as populist and unrealistic by his adversaries, including the outgoing prime minister.

Kostov came to power in 1997 in a country facing economic disaster and embarked on a programme of strict budgetary controls imposed by the International Monetary Fund (IMF).

The outgoing Bulgarian parliament was the first since 1989 to have completed its full four-year mandate.

A series of opinion polls Friday suggested that the coalition led by Simeon, who celebrates his 64th birthday on Saturday, was set for victory, but would not win an absolute majority in parliament.

The polls gave him between 36 and 43 percent of the vote, compared to between 18 and 27.6 percent for the UDF and 14-21 percent for the Coalition for Bulgaria, led by the ex-communist Socialist Party (PSB).

Simeon told AFP in an interview that he could form a coalition with the UDF, depending on the result of Sunday's polls. Kostov has not ruled out such a possibility.

The former king is not standing as a candidate in the elections and has not specified his exact role if his coalition were elected.

To lower the risk of unrest at Sunday's polls, a 48-hour ban on alcohol consumption was decreed on the eve of the elections, and all political campaigning was banned on Saturday.
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PHOTO CAPTION

A worker hangs a large poster showing the former King Simeon of Bulgaria, in downtown Varna, some 400 kilometers (249 miles) east of Sofia, Wednesday, June 6, 2001. The "King Simeon II National Movement" has a comfortable first-place lead in opinion polls for the Bulgarian parliamentary elections on June 17, 2001. (AP Photo/Petar Petrov)
- Jun 06 11:09 AM ET
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