site.btaJustice Minister, Deputy Sports Minister Resign Amid Apartment Purchase Controversy

ESD 13:25:31 23-03-2019

LN1331ES.104
104 POLITICS - JUSTICE MINISTER - RESIGNATION amplified 2

Justice Minister, Deputy Sports Minister
Resign Amid Apartment Purchase
Controversy


Sofia, March 23 (BTA) - Bulgarian Justice Minister Tsetska Tsacheva resigned on Saturday amid a controversy over an apartment she purchased recently at below-market prices. The announcement was made by her Ministry at noon.

Later in the day, the Government Information Service reported that Prime Minister Boyko Borissov had met with Tsacheva in the morning and had accepted her resignation. She reportedly said she did not want the tensions that had flared to affect the work of the Government.

Vanya Koleva is resigning as Deputy Minister of Youth and Sports, her Ministry said in a press release Saturday afternoon. Koleva was asked to leave office by Prime Minister Boyko Borissov.

The moves come a day after the Counter-Corruption Commission and the Supreme Cassation Prosecution Office said they were launching probes against Tsacheva, Koleva and two other ranking GERB figures: GERB Party Deputy Leader and Floor Leader Tsvetan Tsvetanov and parliamentary Culture Committee Chairman Vezhdi Rashidov, all of whom have acquired underpriced luxury apartments in central Sofia from the same seller, Arteks Engineering. Arteks is also going to be probed. Tsacheva said she had herself asked for the check.

The four apartment buyers have denied any wrongdoing.

Prime Minister and GERB leader Boyko Borissov was in Brussels when the scandal erupted. He said that he would wait for the competent authorities to look into the matter and that difficult decisions might have to be made.

Reactions

VMRO Deputy Chairman and United Patriots MP Yulian Angelov: "Tsacheva's resignation was her personal choice and is an admirable moral act. I support her because she a really good expert and Bulgarian politician. I expect the institutions to run objective checks and, if the law has been violated, to impose sanctions. The United Patriots do not claim and do not desire the justice portfolio. The ruling coalition [of GERB and the United Patriots] is stable".

Volya leader and National Assembly Deputy Chairman Vesselin Mareshki: "Tsacheva's resignation gives Prime Minister Borissov a welcome occasion for a more thorough Cabinet shake-up, so that the Government could start working far more efficiently on the people's agenda: incomes, healthcare, education, demographic crisis, coping with conventional crime, which are Bulgarians' everyday concerns." LN, LG
//