site.btaSocialist Spokesperson Yoncheva Elected to Top Party's List for European Elections

ESD 16:46:01 17-03-2019
ZH1645ES.104
104 POLITICS-BSP-EUROPEAN ELECTIONS-FRONT-RUNNER

Socialist Spokesperson Yoncheva
Elected to Top Party's List
for European Elections


Sofia, March 17 (BTA)- The opposition Bulgarian Socialist Party (BSP) elected BSP Spokesperson and MP Elena Yoncheva to top BSP's list of candidates for the May elections for European Parliament. Yoncheva was elected at a plenum closed to the media after debates that went on for four hours, which were followed by a secret ballot. Yoncheva got 95 votes, while her strongest contender, Sergei Stanishev, President of the Party of the European Socialist, former BSP leader and prime minister of Bulgaria, got 75 votes.

Yoncheva's nomination enjoyed big support from the local chapters of the BSP. In a speech at the plenum, BSP leader Kornelia Ninova said that Yoncheva not only had the biggest number of nominations from the local chapters' conferences, but was liked by voters who are not BSP members. "This has been stated time and again by people who are not part of the party or its traditional supporters," Ninova said.

"Elena combines in her the qualities of a politician and journalist who, besides the fight against corruption, champions the freedom of speech and independent journalism," Ninova said. She also thanked the delegates at the plenum for the support for the decision of the party's parliamentary group, BSP For Bulgaria, to leave Parliament.

Yoncheva's contender Stanishev was mostly supported by the internal opposition in the BSP. Approached several days before the plenum to say whether he would cede the leading position in the election list to his former partner in life Elena, Stanishev said that "politics is not a bus where one gives their seat to a mother with a kid".

Other contenders for the top position in BSP's list with many nominations from the local chapters were BSP deputy head Denitsa Slateva, MPs Ivo Hristov and Roumen Gechev, along with incumbent MEPs Peter Kourpumbashev and Momchil Nekov, BSP Deputy Chairman Kiril Dobrev said.

Elena Yoncheva is an MP of the BSP in the 44th National Assembly. Yoncheva made a film about the fence along the border with Turkey, which gave rise to numerous spats with former deputy prime minister Valeri Simeonov. At the start of 2019 the prosecuting magistracy pressed money laundering charges against Yoncheva in connection with the failed Corporate Commercial Bank (CorpBank). The BSP described the case as "politically motivated" and rallied behind Yoncheva.

The BSP will be ready with the full list of its runners on April 6. IG/ZH//