site.btaMRF Honorary Chair Dogan Says Party's Central Operative Bureau Is "the Guillotine"

The press office of the Movement for Rights and Freedoms (MRF) wing close to honorary chair Ahmed Dogan posted on Wednesday on its Facebook page a video of Dogan's speech at a meeting with the MRF Central Operative Bureau, which was held on Tuesday. The Central Operative Bureau Tuesday voted to expel Delyan Peevski, one of the two MRF chairs (the other being Dzhevdet Chakarov), and MRF ranking members Halil Letifov, Iskra Mihaylova-Koparova, Jordan Tzonev, Hamid Hamid, Stanislav Anastassov, Radoslav Revanski and Erten Anisova. Dogan stressed that "the Central Operative Bureau is the guillotine". 

"I am convinced that those already exempted, those excluded, have not read Article 6. Article 6 is the negative side of our history, our negative experience. It is an experience suffered, there is a philosophy behind it, even in some ways very tolerant - there is a temporary exclusion, possibly to give an opportunity to correct, but there is also a stricter part that is uncompromising," Ahmed Dogan says in the video from the meeting. 

"We [the MRF wing close to Dogan] stick to the tougher part because too much has been done by the boy [Peevski] already, there's no going back, but there's no going back for us either," Dogan noted. "This decision is expected from the whole Bulgaria, I even hear such talk already, that the question is not to save the MRF, the question is to save Bulgaria," the MRF honorary chairman added.

In his words, only the Central Operative Bureau is the panacea. "Only the Central Operative Bureau is the guillotine in such cases, so to speak," Dogan pointed out.  

He said that years ago the MRF had done everything possible not to turn the Central Operative Bureau into a guillotine, but to have other bodies that can make a decision of this kind. Dogan stressed that Peevski and Revanski can be excluded locally, by the regional structures, and by the Central Operative Bureau. 

"Especially at the suggestion of the honorary chairman, especially in times of crisis, his [of the honorary chairman] powers are heavy. Even from the action of July 10, when I asked them to resign - to vacate the positions they held, they are no longer members of this Bureau, this from my very suggestion, my very call - this is enough. In this case, I am the higher authority, even than the Central Operative Bureau," Dogan said. 

A Tuesday statement from Peevski, following the results of the Central Operative Bureau meeting, reads: "I saw that there was a meeting of defectors from the MRF, who were expelled from the parliamentary group. After they tried to steal the MRF brand, they lost their capacity to represent the party." Peevski added that the alleged defectors live in a parallel world and should realize that Bulgaria is a country where "everything happens according to the law".

Following a rift in the party amid what appears to be a battle over the control of the party between Peevski and Dogan, the honorary chair urged the floor leader to come down, but Peevski refused to comply. 

Signs of the rift within the MRF became apparent on July 3, when even though Dogan advised his party's parliamentary group not to support the GERB-UDF cabinet proposal, 30 of the 45 MRF MPs voted in favour of Rosen Zhelyazkov's nomination for prime minister, 14 were against, and one abstained.

On July 10, Dogan sent a letter to all MRF members calling for the resignations of Peevski, Letifov, Anastassov, Hamid, Anisova and Revanski.

Peevski's response was that he would not give up, as this would be an act of betrayal towards the people who had trusted him.

On July 11, the parliamentary group of the MRF decided to expel 17 MPs, including one of the MRF's two chairpersons Dzhevdet Chakarov.

Peevski stated that the 17 MPs "expelled themselves" by trying to bring discord within the party and destroy it.