site.btaPresident Radev: "Bulgarians Are Entitled to Know the Real Situation of Their Country"

August 6 (BTA) - "Bulgarians massively reject propaganda
and are entitled to know the real situation of the country and
to seek an alternative to the present-day quandary," Bulgarian
President Rumen Radev said on Wednesday.

"The Prime Minister never ventured out of his self-created world
 of illusions," the President noted.

He commented that the "legacy of the crashed autocracy" is
extremely dire and "we can only overcome it with common will and
 an active civic stance."

The head of State said that "at this historic moment, Bulgarians
 have emerged from the apathy and the hypnosis of propaganda and
 fearlessly spell out the truth about the captive state, about
the lies, arrogance and plunder of the incumbents. [. . .] The
calls for resignation and fair elections with machine and remote
 voting that reverberate both at home and abroad are a fact."

National Strategic Document

Radev spoke at the Boyana Residence during a presentation of a
draft National Strategic Document elaborated by the Strategic
Council with the President.

He explained that the National Strategic Document will be
presented at three stages: analysing the situation of the
country, identifying the reasons for this situation, and
formulating strategic proposals and conditions for their
implementation.

The first part of the draft concludes that by 2020 Bulgarian
society is characterized by exceedingly alarming persistent
trends: high death rate, bad health status, low birth rate,
migration of working-age population, worsening deficiencies in
the quality of education and professional competencies,
spirituality and upbringing, drastic and growing social
inequalities, poverty and exclusion, Strategic Council Chair
Alexander Marinov said at the presentation of the document.

He added that, according to the National Strategic Document, the
 Bulgaria 2020 National Development Programme has failed to
achieve its objectives and priorities as a key strategic
document because of the manner in which the national strategy
was drawn up and implemented in the context of profound systemic
 deficiencies in the model of state governance and in the
relations between the State and citizens.

Marinov noted that public consensus on the requisite changes
requires agreement regarding the diagnosis. Hence, the Strategic
 Council with the President is asking the public whether they
believe that Bulgaria now is a competitive economy creating
conditions for full-fledged social, creative and professional
self-fulfilment of people, as Bulgaria 2020 states, and is it
feasible that in 2030 Bulgaria will be a country of high living
standards and competitive low-carbon economy, a highly educated
and healthy society, an attraction for investments and human
resources.

After the main points of the diagnosis are discussed and
identified, the vision, objectives, priorities and start of
overcoming the crisis will be formulated, Marinov said. RY/LG

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