site.btaSocialists Consider Demanding Education and Science Minister's Resignation

Socialists Consider Demanding Education and Science Minister's Resignation

Sofia, December 24 (BTA) - The Bulgarian Socialist Party (BSP)
is considering to demand the resignation of the Education and
Science Minister over his remarks about world-famous scientists,
 which he made during an open lesson in a school in Vratsa
(Northwest Bulgaria), reads a position published by the party on
 Saturday.

On December 9, 2014, the Minister of Education and Science,
Todor Tanev, mocked the institution which he represents with his
 professor title and long experience as the head of the
Political Science Department at the St. Kliment Ohridski Sofia
University. Then, during an open Chemistry lesson before
students from a school in Vratsa, Tanev gives extremely negative
 and mocking assessments and descriptions of leading names in
the science field, which have become symbols of social progress,
 reads BSP's statement. Tanev said that "Frederic Joliot-Curie
is a complete zero as a scientist." With a few sentences, the
Minister rejects the contributions to science made by Mikhail
Lomonosov and Asen Zlatarov, while stressing the achievements of
 Marie Curie, who was a Noble laureate in two fields.

It is unacceptable to understate the work and contributions of
French scientist Frederic Joliot-Curie, who was awarded the
Nobel prize in Chemistry in 1935 for the discovery of
"artificial radioactivity", which he made together with his
wife, just because he was part of the French resistance. The
Minister's disparaging attitude towards Mikhail Lomonosov is
also unacceptable, as Lomonosov was the first to define modern
physical chemistry. It is unacceptable to belittle the
contributions made to science and the works of Prof. Asen
Zlatarov, who in the 1930s created the field of bromatology,
named after him in the world scientific literature.

Minister Tanev apologized for his remarks on the social networks
 on Saturday.