On August 1, 1990, Zhelyo Zhelev was elected Chairman-President of the Republic of Bulgaria by the Grand National Assembly. This became possible after the previous attempt to elect Dr. Petar Dertliev failed.
In the voting on August 1, 1990 in the plenary hall, Zhelyo Zhelev was elected President from the UDF quota, and Atanas Semerdzhiev was elected Vice President from the BSP quota.
On January 19, 1992, in the second round of the first direct democratic presidential elections in the country, Zhelyo Zhelev and Blaga Dimitrova were elected President and Vice President, nominated by the Union of Democratic Forces coalition. He held this position until January 1997. With his activities as head of state, Zhelev has merit for preserving civil peace in the country in extremely difficult and dangerous conditions, as well as for the signing in 1994 of the Framework Agreement for Bulgaria's participation in the NATO program "Partnership for Peace".
Dr. Zhelyu Zhelev was born on March 3, 1935 in the village of Veselinovo, Shumen region. In 1958, he graduated in philosophy from the Sofia University "Kliment Ohridski". From 1961 to 1964, he was a full-time graduate student at the Faculty of Philosophy of Sofia University. He was a member of the Bulgarian Communist Party, but in 1965 he was expelled and interned in the village of Grozden because of the criticism in his dissertation of Lenin's definition of matter. For political and ideological reasons, he remained unemployed until 1972.
In 1974, he defended his dissertation "The Philosophical Definition of Matter and Modern Natural Science" and became a candidate of philosophical sciences, and in 1995 he began working as a research associate at the Institute of Culture. From 1977 to 1982, he was head of the "Culture and Personality" section at the institute. In 1982, his book "Fascism" was published with the original title "The Totalitarian State", which was banned and suspended from distribution, but translated into 10 languages. In 1988 defended his doctoral dissertation "Relational Theory of Personality".
In the late 1980s, Zhelyu Zhelev was one of the initiators and organizers of the first informal opposition organizations in Bulgaria. On November 3, 1988, he was among the founders of the Club for Support of Glasnost and Perestroika in Bulgaria. On January 19, 1989, he participated in the meeting of 12 Bulgarian intellectuals - dissidents with French President François Mitterrand at the French Embassy in Bulgaria.
On December 7, 1989, at the founding meeting of the coalition Union of Democratic Forces (UDF), he was elected the first chairman of the Coordination Council (CC) of the coalition, re-elected on July 6, 1990. He participated in the Round Table (January 3 - May 14, 1990). He was a deputy in the 7th Grand National Assembly /VNS/.
In 1991 he was elected a member of the Supreme Council and a “doctor honoris causa” in philosophy of the International Academy “Medici”. On September 5, 1992 in Mainz, Germany, he was elected an individual member of the Liberal International and a member of the Bureau of the organization, and since September 8, 1994 he has been its honorary patron. In 1996, he founded and chairs the “Dr. Zhelyu Zhelev” Foundation. Since 1998, he has been a member of the Board of Directors of the Atlantic Club in Bulgaria. He initiated the establishment of the Balkan Political Club in May 2001 in Sofia and was elected chairman. On April 28, 2001 under his patronage, the Association of Philosophers of Southeast Europe was established.
In 2004, as a special representative of the Bulgarian chairmanship in the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), Dr. Zhelyu Zhelev held a series of talks in Georgia on the problem of resolving the conflict in South Ossetia. In March 2005, as a special envoy of the head of state Georgi Parvanov, he participated in the High-Level Meeting on Democracy, Terrorism and Security in Madrid. In 2011, he was a special envoy of the Minister of Foreign Affairs Nikolay Mladenov in Tunisia as an observer of the elections for the country's constitutional assembly.
Zhelyu Zhelev is an honorary doctor of the universities of Maine, Tel Aviv, Ankara, Moderna (Lisbon), the American University in Blagoevgrad, the South-Eastern University "Neofit Rilski", the University of Technology "St. St. Cyril and Methodius. He was twice named “Man of the Year” (1990,1992). On November 26, 2002, he was honored by the Atlantic Club in Bulgaria for his contribution to the affirmation of Atlantic values.
On March 7, 2005, President Georgi Parvanov honored Dr. Zhelyu Zhelev with the highest state award - the “Stara Planina” Order with a ribbon for his exceptional merits as head of state, for his contribution to the building and affirmation of democracy and on the occasion of the 70th anniversary of his birth.
On January 15, 2010, Macedonian President Gjorge Ivanov awarded him the highest state award of Macedonia - the “Eighth of September” Order for his contribution to Bulgaria being the first to recognize the independence of Macedonia, as well as for strengthening its international position.
He is the author of the books "Fascism" (1982), "Real Physical Space" (1989), "Man and His Personalities. A Relational Theory of Personality." (1991), "The President's Addresses to the People and Parliament" (1998), "The National Round Table - January 3-May 14, 1990" (1998), "In Big Politics" (1998), "Addresses to the Nation," "Interviews January 1989-September 2000" (2004), "Despite Everything" (2005), "Myths and Legends of the Bulgarian Transition" (2014).
Since 2013, Dr. Zhelyu Zhelev has participated in the Council of Presidents - an initiative of President Rosen Plevneliev, where together with President (1997-2002) Petar Stoyanov and President (2002-2012) Georgi Parvanov they informally exchange opinions on various topics and important issues for the country.
Lastly, on January 28, 2015, in this format they united around the need to establish a new tone of communication among Bulgarian politicians, which is of utmost importance for achieving the domestic political stability that Bulgaria needs.