site.btaPrime Minister Orders Three Ministers to Resign in Wake of Svoge Bus Tragedy

106 POLITICS - MINISTERS - RESIGNATIONS - amplified 4

Prime Minister Orders
Three Ministers to Resign in Wake of
Svoge Bus Tragedy


Sofia, August 31 (BTA) - Prime Minister Boyko Borissov ordered
the resignation of three of his ministers: Ivaylo Moskovski of
Transport, Information Technology and Communications, Nikolai
Nankov of Regional Development and Public Works and Valentin
Radev of Interior, in connection with an August 25 bus crash at
Svoge, Sofia Region, which claimed 17 lives, the government
information service reported on Friday.

The three ministers submitted their resignations, which now
require a vote in the National Assembly in order to take effect,
Nankov told a news briefing in the Council of Ministers
building later in the day. Nankov said: "Our main goal is to
achieve justice in this case as soon as possible. We will
cooperate in every way to ensure that the Svoge case is solved
most impartially." His colleague Radev noted that they will keep
doing their job until the National Assembly votes on their
resignations.

According to the Interior Minister, the time since Sunday was
necessary so that all relevant materials could be handed over to
the investigators. "That is why we needed these several days -
we are the people who know the systems best," Radev explained.

Taking a reporter's question, Nankov said the three intended
resignations are a way for the respective ministries to bear
political responsibility as they are concerned with the
circumstances of the tragic accident. Radev said he has not
written any reasoning for his resignation but has talked with
Prime Minister Borissov. The Interior Minister noted that the
Svoge disaster happened at a time when road accidents were
decreasing.

Ministers Radev and Nankov told journalists that they will most
likely return to Parliament as MPs, after the Prime Minister
demanded their resignation. The Transport Minister was not
present for the news briefing because he is on sick leave.

It would not be right to comment the responsibility of other
participants in the process, said Minister Nankov. The former
chairs of the Road Infrastructure Agency's Management Board are
currently being questioned at the National Investigative
Service, but no other resignations have been tendered, Nankov
said.

Traffic accidents in 2017 and 2018 have been decreasing, which
is hard to believe given the many lives claimed by the recent
tragedy, Radev said. According to him, the number of casualties
has been halved since GERB's first cabinet.

The Interior Minister commented that seven alerts have been
submitted regarding the road section, where the bus crashed,
which is about all the Ministry can do. "Obviously, we and those
before us did not do the best job possible," he said.

Nankov said that the coordination between the three ministries
was probably not at the necessary level. If daily control was
exercised over the roads, including the one where the bus
crashed, maybe the accident could have been avoided, he said.
The Minister described the lack of road safety coordination as
one of the three ministers' mistakes.

Bulgarian Socialist Party (BSP) Deputy Chair Kiril Dobrev said
at a news conference at his party's headquarters on Friday that
the whole Cabinet's resignation is the only way out of the
current political crisis. BSP also demands the resignation of
Justice Minister Tsetska Tsacheva over this year's prison
escapes and the Commercial Register's collapse, and that of
Agriculture and Food Minister Roumen Porozhanov over the crisis
with the culling of animals in the southeastern region of
Strandzha.

GERB does not accept any of the Socialists' theses, especially the one related to corruption, said GERB MP Toma Bikov during a news conference Friday in the coastal city of Varna. Their talk pertaining to this topic does not matter at all, he said, recalling that nobody took political responsibility when the EU funds were suspended during Sergei Stanishev's and Plamen Oresharski's Socialist-led governments. "If BSP tables a no confidence motion, we will reject it," Bikov said. The three ministers' resignations are viewed as effectively assuming political responsibility for a tragedy, Bikov said, adding that he expects everyone down the ladder to be held criminally liable in a court of law for what happened.

Internal Macedonian Revolutionary Organization (IMRO) Deputy Chair Iskren Vesselinov commented the three ministers' resignations in the Danubian city of Rousse on Friday by saying that they do not come as a surprise for his party. According to him, GERB did not hold preliminary consultations on the topic with IMRO or any of the other coalition partners. IMRO is firm in its stance that political responsibility must be assumed by all responsible for the accident, he said. Vesselinov expressed concern that the full revelation of those truly responsible [for the bus tragedy] may be left incomplete by this quick political move, which obviously aims to reduce tension among the public.

Commenting the three ministers' resignations, head of the Gallup polling agency Purvan Simeonov told BTA that the ministerial reshuffles had been foretold. According to him, the resignations are an attempt by Borissov to act proactively by doing something that was already foretold, while the tragic accident gave him the reason. Two of these resignations were overdue - that of Transport Minister Moskovski and that of Interior Minister Radev, while Nikolai Nankov could not avoid becoming part of the package, since he is in charge of infrastructure, Simeonov said, adding that the important thing is to see who the new ministers will be. RY, LI/VE, MY
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