site.btaMedia Review: April 16

EARLY PARLIAMENTARY ELECTIONS

Trud's frontpage article is dedicated to the upcoming snap parliamentary elections on June 9. According to the article, machine voting here will be dependent on Smartmatic, a foreign company, which owns the software for the machines and is responsible for updating it before each election. The daily quotes former chairperson of the Central Election Commission (CEC), Ivilina Alexieva-Robinson, who stated that machines have never been the solution to vote buying. She believes that the CEC should be in charge of all processes related to the election process instead of delegating that responsibility to other parties.

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Duma's frontpage quotes Bulgarian Socialist Party (BSP) leader Korneliya Ninova who said in an interview for bTV: "The system of the Interior Ministry is rotten from within, and the BSP has no confidence that it will hold fair elections." She continued to criticize Continue the Change - Democratic Bulgaria (CC-DB) for "embracing" the model of government introduced by GERB, even though CC-DB had declared they were against it, which ultimately brought back GERB leader Boyko Borissov to power.

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In an interview for the Bulgarian National Radio (BNR) quoted by 24 Chasa and Telegraph, sociologist Dimitar Ganev from Research Agency Trend said that if a majority is formed after the upcoming parliamentary elections, it will be around GERB-UDF. Ganev sees three possible scenarios for an assemblage [a term used to describe the former regular government's ruling majority that often carries a negative connotation] after the elections. Option one would be to have GERB and the Movement for Rights and Freedoms (MRF) sit down to negotiate with CC-DB, i.e. a similar scenario to how the previous regular government was formed. Option two would have GERB and the MRF seek support outside CC-DB, as the two parties would not have enough seats to form an independent majority. Option three would be to have another snap elections in the autumn.

Asked if there is a rift within the CC-DB coalition, Ganev said that there has been tension in this coalition from the first day. In case CC's image gets damaged too much, DB may choose to split, the sociologist said.

POLITICS

An article in mediapool.bg entitled "Borissov Orders New Foreign Minister, Glavchev Complies" from Monday night reports that caretaker Prime Minister Dimitar Glavchev has proposed to president Rumen Radev to replace Foreign Minister Stefan Dimitrov with GERB MP and former foreign minister Daniel Mitov.

The official motive for the change in the caretaker Cabinet is "the need for timely and responsible coordination and communication among members of the caretaker Government, as well as with allies and partners".

Earlier Monday, GERB leader Boyko Borissov criticized caretaker Foreign Minister Stefan Dimitrov for his position on Ukraine. Borissov said that if Glavchev did not comply with the recommendation to replace Stefan Dimitrov, "I will make him comply later."

Borissov said he had proposed to have Mariya Gabriel and Assen Vassilev keep their posts in the caretaker cabinet of foreign and finance minister respectively. He did not specify to whom he made that proposal. Vassilev on the other hand stated that such a development was impossible.

Borissov said that it was MRF leader Delyan Peevski who first proposed Hristo Ivanov and then Atanas Slavov as justice minister to drive the changes in the Constitution and the judicial reform. Therefore, it is CC-DB that is responsible for the limited range of persons from which the president can choose a caretaker prime minister.

ECONOMY

Trud cites data from the National Statistical Institute, according to which the annual inflation in Bulgaria by the end of March was 3%, which is still too high to have the country join the eurozone. One of the criteria for joining the euro area is inflation to be no more than 1.5% higher than price growth in the three EU Member States with the lowest inflation. Inflation in the euro area averaged 2.4% at the end of March, according to preliminary data from Eurostat. This is not much different from inflation in Bulgaria, however, there are countries in the EU with extremely low inflation. In Lithuania, the year-on-year price increase is just 0.3%. In Finland, annual inflation is just 0.7%, and in Latvia it is 1%.

Telegraph's spin on the same story is that inflation here reached its lowest in the past three years. The daily writes: "In March, monthly inflation was 0.2% and annual inflation - March 2024 compared to March 2023 - was 3%. The last time we had 3% annual inflation was in July 2021, when the consumer price index started climbing up to reach a peak of 18.7% in September 2022, investor.bg calculations show." The article specifies that in March, food and non-alcoholic beverage prices fell by 0.1%. Clothing and footwear prices also decreased by 0.6%, while housing, water, electricity, gas and other fuel costs fell by 0.5%. On the other hand, entertainment and cultural events went up 0.9%, transport by 0.8%, alcohol and tobacco by 0.6%, healthcare by 0.2%.

Duma writes that salaries in Bulgaria are inadequately low, which is why despite the lower inflation growth, working people in the country are struggling to afford anything beyond food and utilities. According to the daily, nearly half of the workforce in Bulgaria is paid the minimum monthly wage, i.e. BGN 930 before tax, or close to it.

ENERGY

Trud quotes Electricity System Operator Executive Director Angelin Tsachev who, during a forum organized by the Bulgarian Industrial Capital Association in Sofia on Monday, said that electricity bills can be lowered, if Bulgaria imports electricity from renewable energy sources (RES) in the Baltic Sea and the North Sea regions. To do so, Bulgaria has proposed a project to the European Commission to have an energy corridor built to connect Germany, Poland, Romania, Bulgaria and Greece. Another proposed project is connecting Turkiye, Greece, Bulgaria, Albania and Italy, so that Bulgaria can utilize imported energy in the evenings during peak hours, when Bulgaria's neighbours use less electricity due to the different time zones.

Parliamentary Energy Committee Chair Delyan Dobrev spoke at the same forum about the negative electricity prices that were in place over the weekend due to the sunny weather leading to high RES production and the low consumption. One MW/h cost minus BGN 88, which, according to Dobrev, is bad for the RES but beneficial for the energy industry in the medium term. The MP said that extremely high and extremely low prices can be good, as the spike in electricity prices at the end of 2022 led to investing in RES, while the current extreme drop is likely to lead to investing in batteries and other systems to store energy. Dobrev said that some one million such systems are already operated by users in Germany, half of which were built in 2023.

TOURISM

Telegraph's frontpage reports that one million Bulgarians are expected to travel over the Easter holidays, with 130,000 of them taking to the seacoast. The data is based on analysis provided by the head of the Institute of Analysis and Assessment in Tourism, Rumen Draganov.

HEALTHCARE

24 Chasa warns that the sudden change of the weather and temperature drops can cause heart attacks, asthma attacks, migraines and exacerbation of stomach ulcers. While the temperatures at the start of the week hit 30C, they are expected to drop to 8C to 10C on Wednesday and Thursday.

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Telegraph reports that some general practitioners have introduced a fee that ranges from BGN 5 to 10 for issuing electronic prescriptions for patients with chronic illnesses. While this fee is not yet a frequent occurrence, that may change, if watchdogs fail to act soon, head of the National Association of General Practitioners in Bulgaria, Dr Georgi Mindov, told the daily.

SCIENCE

In an interview for Trud, astronomer and Head of Media Relations at the European Southern Observatory (ESA), Mariya Lyubenova, spoke about the significance of space in the modern world. Lyubenova said: "Space is humanity's next geopolitical frontier, and we may already be at the point of crossing it. Bulgaria is now at an important juncture where various young companies are keen to enter this arena - harnessing near space - and they will. I am absolutely convinced." She also spoke about Bulgaria's potential membership in the European Space Agency, saying: "Bulgaria currently has a cooperation agreement with ESA. This is a five-year period for Bulgarian science and industry to prepare for full membership in the agency. Bulgaria signed the first such agreement ten years ago, which is the natural way for all countries to become members. Unfortunately, the first five-year period was not particularly successful. Not enough companies took part in the various competitive bidding procedures to develop space technologies. In 2022, another such agreement was signed for a new five-year period. Once it expires, it will be a question of Bulgaria and ESA making a full assessment of whether our companies have developed sufficient capacity to be competitive in the market. That is, we as a country need to assess whether the membership fee that we will pay for full membership can be paid back through businesses developing technology in the form of procurement. That is how ESA works - as much as a country pays in membership, it gets back, but also much more, because the different technologies that companies develop, they are not only obliged to offer them to ESA, but also to their other customers, and so they make additional turnover. I am optimistic seeing what young Bulgarian companies are doing."

RELIGION

All TV channels and the BNR report that unknown persons have desecrated the grave of Neophyte, Patriarch of Bulgaria and Metropolitan of Sofia, who passed away on March 13, 2024. The cross on the grave was removed and broken, and so was part of the grave's marble surrounding.